Join us in celebrating June as African American Music Appreciation Month with a lecture from music historian and professor of Jazz Studies, Todd Wright. The program, Personalities in Jazz: A North Carolina Connection, will focus on the contributions of three genre-defining musicians who all hail from North Carolina: John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, Nina Simone. This program is part of the inaugural High Country Jazz Festival.
This special event is part of the Jagged Path: the African Diaspora in Western North Carolina in Craft, Music, and Dance exhibit on display though October 22, 2022. The exhibit illuminates the obscured history of African contributions to craft, music, and dance in Western North Carolina. Drawing connections from the 17th through 21st centuries., the Jagged Path will demonstrate how African traditions that survived the Middle Passage have helped create the culture of Western North Carolina through interviews, performances, historic artifacts, artist residencies, and more.
About the Speaker
Todd Wright, as director of the jazz studies program at Appalachian State University, has been responsible for directing Jazz Ensembles I and II, teaching courses in jazz improvisation, jazz history, jazz piano, jazz tunes, coaching combos and teaching applied lessons. He oversees the course of study for the Jazz Certification Program, and in 1993 created the university’s Jazz Vocal Ensemble. He has earned degrees from the University of Pikeville (KY), Appalachian State University (NC), and the University of South Florida (Tampa) where he taught while pursuing graduate studies in jazz. He has been the recipient of several university and community service awards, and was selected a winner of the Jazz Fellowship Award given by the North Carolina Arts Council. In 2013 Wright was nominated to represent Appalachian StateUniversity in the running for the O. Max Gardner Award, given annually by the Board of Governors of the University of North Carolina to a faculty member who “has made the greatest contribution to the welfare of the human race.” Wright is a trustee to various organizations, including North Carolina Humanities Council. He is a jazz clinician, conducts All-State jazz ensembles, adjudicates at festivals, and speaks on the history of jazz. He is an active jazz saxophonist.
As director of Jazz Ensemble I at Appalachian, he has directed the ensemble on five European performance tours. Wright, in 2007 directed a European performance tour of Appalachian State’s Jazz Ensemble I to Germany, Switzerland, France, Liechtenstein, and Bavaria. Performances in Madrid, with a student combo, took place in 2011. He directed a European performance tour (ASU Jazz Ensemble I) of Germany, Belgium, Holland, France, and Luxembourg in May 2013. The ensemble traveled from Milan to Naples, Italy in May 2015. Two performances were held in Rome. In May 2018 he again directed the ensemble in four Scandinavian performances (Sweden). Others of his students have gone on to perform worldwide. Along with the Unifour Jazz Ensemble he was chosen a winner of Downbeat Magazine’s Gold Award at Musicfest in Chicago and has performed at Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina.
In addition to jazz festivals, participation Wright has performed for corporate and national events such as the United Way and the Master’s Golf Tournament in Augusta, Georgia, among others. He has blown the saxophone for a president and vice-president and has performed at a celebration event on a commercial airliner at 37,000 feet. As a studio musician Wright can be heard on numerous projects of other recording artists. His own debut recording Begonia was followed by Christmas Time Is Here and Reflections, a duo collaboration with New York recording artist Frank Kimbrough at the piano. Two projects, a standards album and one consisting primarily of originals, are not yet available for public release.
Todd has shared the stage with international jazz greats Phil Woods, Jamey Aebersold, Sheila Jordan, Benny Golson, Ben Tucker, Clark Terry, Eddie Daniels, Randy Brecker, James Williams, John Riley, Tony Monaco, Peter Erskine, Derek Smith, Wycliffe Gordon, Herb Ellis, Dr. Billy Taylor, Ingrid Jensen, Marcus Roberts, Jason Marsalis, Ernie Watts, Bill Watrous, Allen Vizzutti, Bernard Purdie, Duffy Jackson, Sam Rivers, Michael Mossman, Jon Faddis, and others. He has shared the stage with entertainers Idina Menzel, Joe Williams, Rita Moreno, the Fifth Dimension and Patti Page, and others, and has opened for the world-famous Dave Brubeck Quartet. He has recorded with Donald Brown and Cyrus Chestnut. Wright has performed in the Caribbean, Mexico, Italy, France, Germany, Spain, Holland, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Sweden, and Brazil. He performs regularly with his jazz groups and has participated in jazz workshops in Germany and Brazil. In Freiburg and Alpirsbach, Germany he conducted workshops (May 2006). He performed in Curitiba, Brazil (November 2013) the premiere of Keith McCutchen’s Jazz Vespers for Chorus, Soloist, Orchestra, and Jazz Quintet (with Camerata Antiqua de Curitiba). In July 2014, in Rio Preto and Olimpia, Brazil, he participated/and performed in the International Brazilian Workshop. Wright has been featured at the University of Florida’s Brazilian Music Institute on several occasions. He has taught at Summer Music Camp at the University of Wisconsin (Madison).
