HARLEM JAZZ SERIES to Present Marty Ehrlich, Craig Harris and More in September
Craig Harris & the Harlem Nightsongs Big Band anchor the weekly gatherings at Mount Morris Ascension Presbyterian Church.
The Harlem Jazz Series will feature performances by Marty Ehrlich, Craig Harris, Adegoke Steve Colson, and Kelvyn Bell, each leading a weekly evening of jazz. Music has always been at the heart of resistance. It moves us, inspires us, and brings people together to strategize, organize, and mobilize. Experience The Thursday Night Rhythms of Resistance, a new series at Mount Morris Ascension Presbyterian Church featuring the one and only Craig Harris & the Harlem Nightsongs Big Band.
Marty Ehrlich - September 4, 2026
One of the most accomplished and wide-ranging woodwind voices in contemporary jazz, Marty Ehrlich has spent more than five decades at the forefront of creative improvised music. A master of saxophone, clarinet, and flute in all their varieties, he plays with a searching depth that has made him one of the most sought-after collaborators in the music - appearing on more than one hundred recordings alongside Muhal Richard Abrams, Anthony Braxton, Jack DeJohnette, Julius Hemphill, Andrew Hill, George Russell, and John Zorn. He studied at the New England Conservatory of Music, has been a professor at Hampshire College, and leads his celebrated Dark Woods Ensemble. Marty Ehrlich brings his extraordinary range of voices to the Harlem Jazz Series on September 4, 2026.
Craig Harris - September 11, 2026
He curates the stage. Tonight, he owns it. Craig Harris - trombonist, composer, bandleader, and the visionary force behind the Harlem Jazz Series itself - steps into the spotlight on Friday, September 11, 2026, the day after his birthday. Born September 10th in Hempstead, New York, Craig Harris has spent his career at the center of jazz's most adventurous and socially engaged music. He toured with the legendary Sun Ra, has performed with Abdullah Ibrahim, David Murray, Lester Bowie, Cecil Taylor, Sam Rivers, Muhal Richard Abrams, and Charlie Haden, and is a 2022 NAACP Image Awards nominee as co-composer of the score for the Oscar-winning film Judas and the Black Messiah. His Harlem Nightsongs ensemble, featured on his acclaimed recording Managing the Mask, brings lush composition and expressive improvisation together in a sound that is unmistakably Craig Harris. Happy birthday, maestro - and welcome to your own stage.
Adegoke Steve Colson - September 18, 2026
A Grammy-nominated pianist, composer, and educator of extraordinary vision, Adegoke Steve Colson has spent his career at the intersection of jazz's deepest creative traditions and its most urgent musical possibilities. Born in Newark and raised in East Orange, New Jersey, he studied at Northwestern University School of Music and joined the legendary Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) in 1972 - connecting himself to one of the most important collectives in the history of American music. He has recorded on Columbia/Sony, Evidence, and Black Saint, authored more than one hundred compositions for ensemble, and released the profound Solo Piano recording Tones For - a meditation on the lives of Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, and Frederick Douglass. He has performed with Joseph Jarman, Reggie Workman, David Murray, Henry Threadgill, Malachi Favors, and Kahil El'Zabar. Adegoke Steve Colson brings his remarkable musical life to the Harlem Jazz Series on September 18, 2026.
Kelvyn Bell - September 25, 2026
A guitarist and vocalist of rare originality, Kelvyn Bell has spent decades creating a sound that defies easy category - jazz, funk, blues, energy music, and improvisation, all woven together with the instinct of a true innovator. Born in St. Louis in 1956, he studied guitar under Oliver Lake and came of age in the Black Artists Group before moving to New York City in the late 1970s, where he quickly established himself as one of the most distinctive voices on the scene. He has had a long creative partnership with saxophonist Arthur Blythe, was a founding member of Joseph Bowie's legendary jazz-funk band Defunkt, and led his own ensemble Kelvynator. He has worked with Steve Coleman, Michele Rosewoman, Jean-Paul Bourelly, Bob Stewart, and the poet Quincy Troupe. Kelvyn Bell brings his singular guitar voice to the Harlem Jazz Series on September 25, 2026.
