Youngest Marsalis Investigates Musical Roots

Ican tell you from personal conversations with Wynton and Ellis and Branford that they’ve all said he’s the most brilliant musician in the family,” Northwest Arkansas jazz guru Robert Ginsburg says of the youngest — and perhaps least known — of the Marsalis brothers. Jason Marsalis brings his quartet to the Walton Arts Center tonight for a unique look at his musical roots, something he calls the BGQ Exploration.

“The Benny Goodman Quartet — with Lionel Hampton, Teddy Wilson and Gene Krupa — was one of the first integrated groups” to hit the big time in the 1930s, Marsalis explains. “There were some amazing virtuosos in that band, the group was just phenomenal, and people really loved that music.

“Anyway, I got the idea to explore that group but to play different music.”

Marsalis says his quartet started playing Goodman’s standard repertoire, “but we started adding things that the group wouldn’t have played.

“The times that we’ve played [this show] the audiences really love it,” he adds. “I think your regular non-musician person enjoys music that’s really swinging, really grooving, something they can really move and relate to. Audiences may be surprised by the instrumentation, but it’s music they recognize.”

Marsalis says his musical upbringing might not be what people imagine, either. There’s 17 years between the oldest and youngest brothers, so “I really wasn’t with them all the time.” But he did always want to follow in their footsteps.

“Music was always something I believed in and enjoyed,” he says. “That’s what I always wanted to do.”

Marsalis says violin was his first serious instrument, but when he started playing percussion in a youth orchestra in junior high, he was well and truly hooked. Later, he took up the vibraphone, and he’s recorded everything from the music of Alaska’s Tlingit tribe to an album with banjoist Bela Fleck.

Even with all that success, Marsalis worries about the state of music, saying “as a whole, it’s not in the best shape.”

“It’s going to take a lot of folks to realize there are things more important that chasing money,” he says. “All you can really do is work toward that cause.”

Courtesy Photo Jason Marsalis tells a story about his parents buying him a set of toy drums when he was 3 and “they used to introduce me to an imaginary audience. They would say, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, introducing the fabulous Jason!’”