Marcus Roberts to return to 2013 Savannah Jazz Festival with new piano concerto

By Linda Sickler

While the Savannah Music Festival brings in many new acts every year, it also brings back some old favorites.

Marcus Roberts and the Marcus Roberts Trio fit into the latter category. Roberts has been involved with the music festival since 2004.

In 2013, he’ll bring a new piano concerto that he’ll perform with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra.

“It’s a pretty major piece with a lot of components to it,” Roberts says.

Co-commissioned by the Savannah Music Festival and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the concerto has been under consideration for some time.

“We finally decided last year to do it,” Roberts says.

“I had been studying a lot of classical pieces and repertoire even before that,” he says. “It’s been a two- or three-year process preparing to write it and I’m still not done, but at least now I can see the finish line.”

There’s another challenging component to the project.

“It’s difficult trying to bring classical form into a jazz environment,” Roberts says.

“It’s not impossible, but it’s very difficult. I guess artistic people like challenges. We like to solve a problem, not create one.”

The end result makes the effort worthwhile. “When people listen to it, they leave the problems in their own lives behind,” Roberts says.

Originally from Jacksonville, Fla., Roberts now lives in Tallahassee, where he is an assistant professor of jazz studies in the school of music at Florida State University.

At the 2013 Savannah Music Festival, Roberts will play several times, including the Swing Central finale on March 29 at the Lucas, a solo concert on March 30 at the Morris Center and with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra on April 6 at the Johnny Mercer Theater. He will appear with his trio, which is himself on piano, Rodney Jordan on bass and Jason Marsalis on drums.

The Marcus Roberts Trio has performed with the Atlanta orchestra before. The trio played Gershwin’s “Concerto in F” both in Atlanta and at the 2009 Savannah Music Festival.

At a late-night jam session on the final night that same year, banjoist Bela Fleck sat in with the Marcus Roberts Trio, which resulted in the 2011 premiere of the Marcus Roberts Trio with Bela Fleck. That project toured all over the country from late 2011 through the summer of 2012.
Photo: Special to Savannah Morning News Marcus Roberts

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