WHO WE ARE The New Orleans Jazz Orchestra (NOJO) is a performing arts institution dedicated to creating and presenting authentic, engaging and transformative Jazz experiences for audiences far and wide. Founded in 2002 by trumpeter, composer and bandleader Irvin Mayfield, NOJO's goal is to strengthen the business of jazz through national tours, public and private performances, educational programming and media platforms. The NOJO, which has headlined all of America’s major performing arts venues and clubs, including Benaroya Hall in Seattle, Ravinia Festival in Chicago,The Dakota Club in Minneapolis and Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City to name a few, performs in the form of a 16-piece big band, an all-star quintet, sextet and other configurations. NOJO was created by Mayfield to be a powerful vehicle for preserving and evolving the cultural and historical legacy of Jazz based in New Orleans, Louisiana, the birthplace of Jazz. As a non-profit organization, NOJO has forged academic partnerships
with the University of New Orleans, where it oversees the New Orleans
Jazz Institute, the University of New Orleans Jazz Orchestra (a pre-professional
performance group) as well as an upcoming Saturday Music School. It also
partners with Tulane University, where its offices are located. Through
its national tours, academic programs and community initiatives, NOJO
is steadfast and focused on its mission to inspire freedom and culture
in the individual and the global community by creating authentic, engaging
jazz experiences while celebrating the origins and transforming the future
of jazz. “…above all, these guys are about playing New Orleans jazz with
blistering Creole fire, a kind of unrestrained fun and virtuosity..” “...a free-playing jam, it’s like a savory dish of musical gumbo……swinging sound of horns, piano, bass and drums, along with the cool-cat musicality….” - DESERET NEWS, SALT LAKE CITY, UT ….the orchestra is the only major performing jazz institution
in post-Katrina NO and has become the most prominent representative
of jazz culture in the Big Easy…” NOJO’s latest album “BOOK ONE” on World Village, a subsidiary of the Harmonia Mundi label, will be released in the Summer of 2009. NOJO has become a vital cog in the revitalization of New Orleans jazz in the post-Katrina era. In November of 2005, NOJO was commissioned by the Christ Church Cathedral to create “All The Saints”, a critically acclaimed orchestral work dedicated to the citizens of New Orleans. As the first jazz performance in New Orleans after the storm, “All The Saints” signified the cultural reopening of the city. The concept for the NOJO came to Mayfield at age 23, after he had already created the Institute of Jazz Culture at Dillard University in New Orleans. “It was a program where the entire university would have a jazz experience,” Mayfield, a Grammy-award nominated and Billboard Award-winning trumpeter, said of the institute. “We would talk about jazz from a literary perspective. We would talk about the social effects of jazz, look at jazz and its representation of the American democratic experience, and talk about the authentic New Orleans experience. And when I looked around the city to see who I could partner with, there was no institution that was doing the business of jazz or performing it 24 hours a day, seven days a week in the city that created jazz.” This led to the creation of the NOJO, after which Mayfield enlisted Ronald Markham to serve as President and CEO. Along with a distinguished nine-member Board of Directors and a seven-member staff, NOJO is dedicated to the long-term development of an industry around jazz and seeks to be a catalyst for a local, national and international discussion on the future of jazz. In 2003, the City of New Orleans, the State of LA and the U.S Senate and Congress appointed Mayfield the official cultural ambassador of the City of New Orleans and the State of Louisiana. In short, NOJO is a business for jazz. Staff: The New Orleans Jazz Orchestra Board of Directors: |