Loyola’s Jazz Underground Series Continues With ‘Battle of the Tenors’

The Jazz Underground Series at Loyola University New Orleans continues with "Battle of the Tenors," featuring saxophonists Tony Dagradi and Derek Douget, on Thursday, March 1 at 7:30 p.m. in Satchmo's, located in the basement of the Danna Student Center on the university's main campus.

According to Dagradi, who is also a professor at Loyola's College of Music and Fine Arts, one of the great traditions throughout all eras of jazz music is the "tenor battle," wherein two master proponents of the tenor saxophone engage in a friendly competition of skill, technique and inventiveness in a jam session-like atmosphere. A longstanding tradition among jazz musicians, famous collaborations include "battles" between Gene Ammons and Sonny Stitt, Johnny Griffin and Eddie "Lockjaw Davis," Al Cohn and "Zoot" Sims and Sonny Rolling and John Coltrane.

Tickets are $10 for general admission, $5 for Loyola faculty and staff, and free for Loyola students. Tickets are available online at www.montage.loyno.edu or by calling 504-865-2074, and will also be available at the door 30 minutes prior to the performance. Free parking is available in the West Road Garag, which is accessible from St. Charles Avenue.

Dagradi, well-known for his work with the award-winning, cutting-edge jazz quartet Astral Project, is an internationally recognized performer, composer, author and educator.  For more than three decades, he has made is home in New Orleans, performing on tenor and soprano sax with many of the Crescent City's most talented artists. 

A New Orleans native, Douget has performed as a sideman with many top jazz artists, including Ellis Marsalis, Nicholas Payton, Elvin Jones, Randy Brecker and the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra, among others.  His recording as a bandleader, "Perpetual Motion," exhibits the broad range of a talented young artist. Douget's music is informed by the unique perspective often characteristic of New Orleans musicians-peppered with the Afro-Caribbean influence that the Crescent City embodies.