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Marquis Hill

From his beginnings as one of Chicago’s most thrilling young trumpeters, to his current status as an internationally renowned musician, composer and bandleader, Marquis Hill has worked tirelessly to break down the barriers that divide musical genres. Contemporary and classic jazz, hip-hop, R&B, Chicago house, neo-soul—to Hill, they’re all essential elements of the profound African-American creative heritage he’s a part of. “It all comes from the same tree,” he says. “They simply blossomed from different branches.”

That mission to bring styles together, complemented by Hill’s absolute mastery of his instrument, is a through line connecting his many achievements. It can be heard on his latest album, Modern Flows Vol. II, with its seamless blend of jazz interplay, hip-hop-infused rhythms and socially conscious spoken-word. It’s integral to The Way We Play, his Concord Jazz debut from 2016, where Hill and his musicians reinvent jazz standards using their generation’s wide- ranging influences. It marks the four records Hill self-released before November of 2014, when he won the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz competition and became a presence on the global scene virtually overnight. And it defines the revelatory live dates by Hill’s longtime working group, the Blacktet, which the Chicago Tribune called “a remarkably polished, immensely attractive ensemble.”

For Hill, playing and listening without limits has long been an instinct. “It comes naturally; that’s the way I hear the music,” he says. “I came up in a household where my mom played Motown, R&B, Isley Brothers, Barry White, Marvin Gaye. Then I received my first jazz record, by Lee Morgan, and that was added to the collection. ... I truly believe that the music is all the same.”

Born in Chicago in 1987 and raised on the city’s culturally rich South Side, Hill began playing drums at age 4, before switching to trumpet in the 6th grade. He attended high school at Kenwood Academy, excelling in its revered jazz-performance program, and was mentored by Bobby Broom, Willie Pickens, Tito Carrillo and other Chicago greats through the Ravinia Jazz Scholars program. Hill earned his bachelor’s in music education from Northern Illinois University and his master’s in jazz pedagogy from DePaul University. During college he made gigs and sessions around Chicago, jamming with and absorbing wisdom from the likes of Fred Anderson, Ernest Dawkins and Von Freeman. Even then, Hill was known in town as a stunningly gifted trumpeter with a soulful, highly textured tone. His sound is now somehow both deeply distinctive and a tour through jazz-trumpet history, evoking the high-drama stillness and space of Miles; the undeniable virtuosity of Clifford Brown and Freddie Hubbard; the groove- savvy phrasing of Lee Morgan and Donald Byrd; and much more.

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Album Review

Caroline Davis: Portals, Volume 2 : Returning

Read "Portals, Volume 2 : Returning" reviewed by Glenn Astarita


Alto saxophonist/composer Caroline Davis, a rising star in the jazz world, has unveiled her second installment of the “Portals" series, titled Portals Vol. 2: Returning. This album serves as a sonic memoir, inspired by her grandmother, Joan “Lady" Anson-Weber, and it represents a deeply personal journey of reflection and healing. As a gifted saxophonist and composer, Davis draws upon her grandmother's poetic legacy to craft a musical experience that is both moving and evocative. This album stands as ...

4
Album Review

Christie Dashiell: Journey In Black

Read "Journey In Black" reviewed by La-Faithia White


Christie Dashiell is an award-winning vocalist, composer, and educator born in Washington, DC and raised in Greenville, NC. Dashiell is a product of a musical family that influenced her to begin singing at an early age. Jazz bassist Carroll Dashiell, Jr is her father. Daughter and father are well known on the Washington DC music scene. Journey In Black consists of nine songs, seven which are original works from Dashiell, and two jazz classics that she recreates nicely. On Journey ...

4
Album Review

Darrell Grant: The New Black

Read "The New Black" reviewed by Paul Rauch


Pianist Darrell Grant's debut album Black Art (Criss Cross) was released in 1994, and became acclaimed as one of the definitive statements of New York jazz in the 1990s. It featured bassist Christian McBride, drummer Brian Blade, and the late, great Wallace Roney on trumpet—all of whom would go on to make major statements of their own in the music. In 2019, some twenty five years later, Grant had the opportunity to revisit the album repertoire at Birdland, convening bassist ...

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Book Review

Ugly Beauty: Jazz In The 21st Century

Read "Ugly Beauty: Jazz In The 21st Century" reviewed by Ian Patterson


Ugly Beauty: Jazz in The 21st Century Phil Freeman 250 Pages ISBN: 978 1 78904 632 8 ZerO Books 2022 There is a scene in Douglas Adams' book The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Pan Books, 1979) where a computer named Deep Thought is about to reveal the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything, having crunched the numbers for a mind-boggling 7.5 million years. To a large, excited crowd, headed by two ...

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Album Review

Joel Ross: The Parable Of The Poet

Read "The Parable Of The Poet" reviewed by Chris May


The story of jazz is part musical and part social, the two strands interacting to shape, on one hand, the sound we hear and, on the other, the demographic who make it and constitute its audience. Viewed from London, the semiology surrounding New York-based vibraphonist Joel Ross' octet, heard on his third Blue Note album, The Parable Of The Poet, tells a social story as much as it does a musical one. The octet's optics (check the ...

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Album Review

Marquis Hill: New Gospel Revisited

Read "New Gospel Revisited" reviewed by Chris May


Chicago-born trumpeter Marquis Hill released his first album while still in college and in 2022, just over a decade later, he has retooled it on New Gospel Revisited, recorded live in his hometown with a fresh lineup and tweaked instrumentation. It is a terrific disc. Like his near contemporary and fellow trumpeter Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, Hill holds his music to be part of a broad musical continuum that includes genres other than jazz, notably hip hop. ...

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Album Review

Makaya McCraven: Deciphering the Message

Read "Deciphering the Message" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi


Il debutto in casa Blue Note di Makaya McCraven è un omaggio alla storia musicale dell'etichetta, espresso ovviamente in prospettiva personale. Come ha fatto nei suoi dischi recenti—e in particolare nell'omaggio a Gil Scott-Heron (We're New Again, XL Recordings 2020)-il batterista e produttore di Chicago usa creativamente la tecnologia sperimentata dai DJ e produttori di hip-hop e club culture, in prospettiva nuova. Il classico repertorio Blue Note degli anni cinquanta e sessanta suscita l'attenzione delle subculture giovanili ...

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Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Source: Michael Ricci

All About Jazz is celebrating Marquis Hill's birthday today!

From his beginnings as one of Chicago’s most thrilling young trumpeters, to his current status as an internationally renowned musician, composer and bandleader, Marquis Hill has worked tirelessly to break down the barriers that divide musical genres. Contemporary and classic jazz, hip-hop, R&B, Chicago house, neo-soul—to Hill, they’re all essential elements of the profound African-American creative heritage he’s a part of. “It all comes from the same tree,” he says. “They ...

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Source: Michael Ricci

All About Jazz is celebrating Marquis Hill's birthday today!

From his beginnings as one of Chicago’s most thrilling young trumpeters, to his current status as an internationally renowned musician, composer and bandleader, Marquis Hill has worked tirelessly to break down the barriers that divide musical genres. Contemporary and classic jazz, hip-hop, R&B, Chicago house, neo-soul—to Hill, they’re all essential elements of the profound African-American creative heritage he’s a part of. “It all comes from the same tree,” he says. “They ...

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Source: Michael Ricci

All About Jazz is celebrating Marquis Hill's birthday today!

From his beginnings as one of Chicago’s most thrilling young trumpeters, to his current status as an internationally renowned musician, composer and bandleader, Marquis Hill has worked tirelessly to break down the barriers that divide musical genres. Contemporary and classic jazz, hip-hop, R&B, Chicago house, neo-soul—to Hill, they’re all essential elements of the profound African-American creative heritage he’s a part of. “It all comes from the same tree,” he says. “They ...

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Source: Michael Ricci

All About Jazz is celebrating Marquis Hill's birthday today!

From his beginnings as one of Chicago’s most thrilling young trumpeters, to his current status as an internationally renowned musician, composer and bandleader, Marquis Hill has worked tirelessly to break down the barriers that divide musical genres. Contemporary and classic jazz, hip-hop, R&B, Chicago house, neo-soul—to Hill, they’re all essential elements of the profound African-American creative heritage he’s a part of. “It all comes from the same tree,” he says. “They ...

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Jazz Musician of the Day: Marquis Hill

Source: Michael Ricci

All About Jazz is celebrating Marquis Hill's birthday today!

From his beginnings as one of Chicago’s most thrilling young trumpeters, to his current status as an internationally renowned musician, composer and bandleader, Marquis Hill has worked tirelessly to break down the barriers that divide musical genres. Contemporary and classic jazz, hip-hop, R&B, Chicago house, neo-soul—to Hill, they’re all essential elements of the profound African- American creative heritage he’s a part of... Read more.

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Music Industry

Jazz this week: A tribute to Ray Kennedy, "Music at the Intersection," Marquis Hill, Mike Dillon Band, and more

Jazz this week: A tribute to Ray Kennedy, "Music at the Intersection," Marquis Hill, Mike Dillon Band, and more

Source: St. Louis Jazz Notes by Dean Minderman

If you're trying to shake the mid-summer doldrums after some punishing heat and humidity over the past few days in St. Louis, getting out to hear some live jazz and creative music could be just the thing. This weekend's musical menu features a benefit for the family of a well-known local musician, a visit from a fast-rising trumpet talent, a free evening of music at multiple venues in Grand Center, and more. Let's go to the highlights... Wednesday, July 15 ...

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Award / Grant

Marquis Hill Wins the Thelonious Monk Competition

Marquis Hill Wins the Thelonious Monk Competition

Source: Michael Ricci

The winner of the 2014 Thelonious Monk International Trumpet Competition is Marquis Hill. Raised on the south side of jny: Chicago, Mr. Hill, 27, is a veteran of that city’s jazz scene and a product of its institutions—he earned a masters degree in jazz pedagogy from DePaul University and plays in the Chicago Jazz Orchestra. He’s currently a teaching associate at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and has released several albums on independent labels. Mr. Hill won in a ...

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Contest

Enter the "Marquis Hill - The Poet" Giveaway at All About Jazz!

Enter the "Marquis Hill - The Poet" Giveaway at All About Jazz!

Source: All About Jazz

All About Jazz members are invited to enter the “Marquis Hill - The Poet“ giveaway contest starting today. We'll select FIVE winners at the conclusion of the contest on December 16th. Click here to enter the contest (Becoming a fan of Marquis Hill at AAJ automatically enters you in the contest.) Good luck! About Marquis Hill At age 26, Marquis Hill is already a well-known name on the Chicago Jazz Scene. After receiving a Bachelor degree in Music Education/Jazz Studies, ...

Recording

"The Poet," 3rd CD By Rising Star Trumpeter Marquis Hill, To Be Released Oct. 22

"The Poet," 3rd CD By Rising Star Trumpeter Marquis Hill, To Be Released Oct. 22

Source: Terri Hinte Publicity

Already an established presence in his native Chicago, trumpeter/composer Marquis Hill will see his star continue to rise on the national jazz scene with the release of The Poet, his third CD in as many years. The dynamic session, featuring his working band, the Blacktet, is due October 22 from Skiptone Music. Hill spent considerable time and care preparing his band for the recording of The Poet, including performing songs from the upcoming album during a February engagement at Chicago’s ...

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Recording

Marquis Hill - New Gospel (2011)

Marquis Hill - New Gospel (2011)

Source: Something Else!

Taking in the first solo steps by a budding jazz talent is usually an excursion into a fresh new discovery. Most of time, these performances are polished and if there's originals, they can be surprisingly well developed. Maybe this shouldn't be all that surprising, because before a jazz musician makes that big step into leading a date for the first time, he (or she) has already devoted most of his life getting to that point, through study, rehearsing and gigging ...

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Tomi Nikku
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Voision Xi
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Concerts

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Portals, Volume 2 :...

Intakt Records
2024

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Journey In Black

Self Produced
2023

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New Gospel Revisited

Edition Records
2022

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Players

Open Mic Records
2022

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The Parable Of The...

Blue Note Records
2022

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The New Black

Lair Hill Records
2022

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Sittin at the Bar

From: Players
By Marquis Hill

There Are Thorns

From: Players
By Marquis Hill

Return Of The Student

From: The Poet
By Marquis Hill

Portrait Of Lola

From: New Gospel
By Marquis Hill

Videos

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