"On the Back Porch," by Adegoke Steve Colson at Hamilton Park & Cultural Center

The 26th Annual Englewood Jazz Festival, presented by Live the Spirit Residency, returns to Chicago’s historic Hamilton Park, expanding to five nights this year on September 16–20, 2025, marking a powerful milestone in American music: the 60th Anniversary of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM). All events are FREE. 

Adegoke Steve Colson, pianist, composer, saxophonist, historian, educator, is a Steinway Artist, and performs internationally as a soloist and leader of ensembles ranging from trios to orchestras. His work appears on labels including Columbia/Sony, Evidence, Black Saint, ECM as well as Silver Sphinx. He earned his degree from Northwestern University School of Music and joined the influential musicians’ collective, the Association for Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) in 1972 while living in Chicago. He returned to the east coast in 1982, moving to Montclair, NJ. His critically acclaimed international performances and recordings often illuminate social issues, and have featured modern innovators as Reggie Workman, David Murray, Wallace Roney, Malachi Favors, Andrew Cyrille, Joseph Jarman, Oliver Lake, Tyshawn Sorey and Henry Threadgill, as well as master artists of other disciplines such as poets/activists Amiri (LeRoi Jones) and Amina Baraka and dancers/choreographers Carmen de Lavallade and Savion Glover. He co-owns recording label Silver Sphinx with wife and musical partner Iqua, and their first release in 1980 later became part of the influential BBC Broadcaster Gilles Peterson’s 2011 compilation Freedom, Rhythm & Sound - Revolutionary Jazz and The Civil Rights Movement” which credited them as the early roots of the “indie” movement alongside such independent innovators as Maurice White, John Coltrane, Sun Ra, and Mary Lou Williams. Their latest Silver Sphinx release Glow: Music for Trio...Add Voice will be released August 2025.