Join us for a Wonderful night out for JazzCity at south shore culTURAL CENTER.
6:30PM - JAZZ LINKS ENSEMBLE
7:00PM - ERNEST DAWKINS “The Double Down Project”
The concert will be held indoors at South Shore Cultural Center at 7059 S South Shore Dr, Chicago, IL 60649.
ERNEST DAWKINS - sax
KEVIN KING - woodwinds
ISAIAH SPENCER - drums
ISAIAH KEITH - drums, vibes
CARMANI EDWARDS - bass
The South Shore Cultural Center was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.
Jazz City is free, family friend, open to the public, and presented by the Jazz Institute of Chicago in partnership with the Chicago Park District and is supported by a CityArts grant from the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, The Illinois Arts Council Agency, a state agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Media sponsors are WDCB and WHPK radio.
MORE ABOUT ERNEST DAWKINS
Dawkins is one of the world's premiere saxophonists and composers, whose life goal is for his music and compositions to reflect the evolving collective cultural memory of the African American jazz aesthetic. His four decades of work as a professional artist, educator, and community-based organizer are widely recognized for shaping the contemporary cultural landscape of Chicago and beyond.
He is the founder and executive director of Live the Spirit Residency and is past Chairman of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM). His latest Commissions from the Jazz Institute of Chicago, to compose Tim Black Blacker Than Black and Refound Connections Commissioned by South Arts, were premiered in 2022.
Other recent projects include a commission from New Music America in 2020 to compose his work “Redefining Fredrick Douglass,” and in 2018 International Connections grant from the MacArthur Foundation to lead the Englewood to Soweto project, and a Joyce Award in 2017 in support of the composition “Quantum Englewood.”
His creative work has additionally included commissions from the Old Town School of Folk Music, the Black Metropolis Research Consortium, Sant'Anna Arresi Jazz Festival, Sons d’Hiver Festival, Banliues Bleues Festival, Meet The Composers, the Jazz Institute of Chicago, and the King Arts Complex of Columbus Ohio. He is the leader and founder of several ensembles, most notably the New Horizons Ensemble, Aesop Quartet, Chicago Trio, Live the Spirit Big Band, and the Chicago 12. Dawkins has recorded numerous CDs and his publishing company, Dawk Music, has seventeen releases to date. Dawkins was named 'Chicagoan of the Year' twice by the Chicago Tribune, most recently in 2001. He received a Meet the Composers Round VII New Residencies grant in 2000 and has been awarded the State of Illinois Governors Fellowship award twice.
In 2008, he received a Governor’s International Grant. Dawkins established The Englewood Jazz Festival, now in its 25th. year, showcasing the work of master musicians at a free annual outdoor event on Chicago’s southside.
Dawkins has worked alongside many pioneering musicians including Ramsey Lewis, Muhal Richard Abrams, Vijay Iyer, Roscoe Mitchell, Henry Threadgill, Amina Claudine Myers, and Anthony Braxton, while also committing himself to uplifting and mentoring the next generations of young artists in Chicago and beyond, connecting tradition and history to the urgency of the present moment.
Jazz Institute of Chicago is proud to receive generous support from the following organizations
The Allstate Foundation; The Alphawood Foundation; a CityArts grant from the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events; Crown Family Philanthropies; Chicago's Cultural Treasures; The Darling Family Foundation; The Field Foundation; The Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelly Foundation; The Lloyd A. Fry Foundation; The Glossberg Foundation; The Illinois Arts Council Agency, a state agency; The National Endowment for the Arts, The Polk Bros. Foundation; The Oppenheimer Family Foundation; The Walder Foundation; The Wang Family.