Marcus Shelby & Beyond the Blues at Healdsburg Jazz Festival at Raven Performing Arts Theater

About

Marcus Shelby is a powerful bass player, bandleader and composer who has taken on an extra task – reminding and educating Americans about African American history and its connection to music, namely blues, gospel, spirituals and jazz. For his show at the Healdsburg Jazz Festival, the music will include freedom songs, gospel songs, the blues, prison songs and will honor the lives of Harriet Tubman and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. His 20-piece orchestra will perform selections from them at a free Sunday morning concert called Beyond the Blues. Guest stars will be the ebullient Tiffany Austin, who graduated from UC Berkeley School of Law but decided she could better serve her community by singing jazz, and Craig Handy, a first-call tenor saxophonist.