A Family Affair. Jon Batiste Grammy Nomination for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album

 

Thursday, November 26, 2020 *********************** For Immediate Release

 

Christian Scott and Jon Batiste; Former students of Kidd Jordan receives Grammy Nominations for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album

 

NEW ORLEANS - Two former music students of New Orleans' Kidd Jordan; Christian Scott; and Jon Batiste were nominated for 2021 Grammy Awards in the category of Best Contemporary Instrumental Album. Both musicians are graduates of the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts and studied under Jordan at the Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong Summer Jazz Camp during their formative years. Jordan has served as the artistic director of the Jazz Camp since its 1995 inception.   Scott, known professionally as Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, is nominated for his album "Axiom" and is also nominated for a second Grammy, in the category of Best Improvised Jazz Solo, for his solo performance "Guinevere," a track from his album "Axiom."   He is the nephew of jazz innovator and legendary sax man, Donald Harrison, Jr. His musical tutelage began under the direction of his uncle at the age of thirteen. After graduating from the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts (NOCCA) in 2001, Christian received a full tuition scholarship to Berklee College of Music where he earned a degree in professional music and film scoring thirty months later.   Since 2002, Christian has released eleven critically acclaimed studio recordings, two live albums and one greatest hits collection. According to NPR, "Christian Scott ushers in new era of jazz". He has been heralded by JazzTimes Magazine as "Jazz's young style God." Christian is known for developing the harmonic convention known as the “forecasting cell” and for his use of an un-voiced tone in his playing, emphasizing breath over vibration at the mouthpiece. The technique is known as his “whisper technique.”   Christian is the progenitor of “Stretch Music,” a jazz rooted, genre blind musical form that attempts to “stretch” jazz’s rhythmic, melodic and harmonic conventions to encompass as many other musical forms, languages and cultures as possible...

 

Jon Batiste, a Kenner native who serves as the bandleader for CBS' "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" and a previous Grammy nominee will be competing with Scott for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album. Batiste is nominated for "Chronology of a Dream: Live at the Village Vanguard."   Batiste also received a second nomination, in the New Age Album category, for his work on "Meditations" with Cory Wong.   As a teenager, Batiste began self-producing and releasing his music on the internet, as well as performing internationally. His major label debut “Hollywood Africans” was nominated for a GRAMMY award for Best American Roots Performance in 2019 and, along with his band Stay Human, he is featured nightly on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. His music is featured in the 2020 Disney Pixar film Soul, and his composing and songwriting will be featured in his large scale, genre-melding symphonic work “American Symphony,” set to be performed at Carnegie Hall in 2021.   Born into a long lineage of Louisiana musicians, Batiste received both his undergraduate and masters degrees in piano from the Juilliard School. He is currently the Music Director of The Atlantic, the Co-Artistic Director of the National Jazz Museum in Harlem and is on the board of Sing For Hope.

 

Joining Scott and Batiste in terms of nominees in the 63rd annual Grammy Awards with local ties are P.J. Morton, Harry Connick Jr., Ledisi and Luke James. Morton a previous Grammy winner and multiple Grammy nominee is nominated for Best Gospel Album for his album, "Gospel According to P.J.: From the Songbook of P.J. Morton."   Three-time Grammy winner Harry Connick Jr. is nominated in the category of Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album, for his album, "True Love: A Celebration of Cole Porter." Ledisi received her 13th nomination for Best Traditional R&B Performance, for "Anything for You."   Luke James, a singer/songwriter/actor from New Orleans, is nominated for Best R&B Album for his second album, "To Feel Loved."   The winners will be announced at the live show on Jan. 31 on CBS and WWL-TV Channel 4. For the full list of nominees, visit the GRAMMYs website here.