Aardvark Jazz Orchestra
with
special guests
Geri Allen, pianist
and
Father Peter F. O’Brien, narrator

Mary Lou Williams Centennial Celebration:
From Swing to Sacred Music, a Journey of Faith

Sunday, May 9, 2010 at 8:00 pm

Boston College, Robsham Theatre
140 Commonwealth Avenue, Chestnut Hill, MA
MBTA: Green Line, B-Branch, Boston College Station.
Parking nearby

Admission: $20, $15 Advance Purchase (by April 30, 2010)
Box Office: 617-552-4002
Information: 617-776-8778

“Mary Lou Williams is perpetually contemporary. Her music retains a standard of quality that is timeless. She is like Soul on Soul.”
(Duke Ellington)

The Aardvark Jazz Orchestra (music director Mark Harvey) will celebrate the centennial of American jazz great Mary Lou Williams (1910-1981) in a concert May 9, 2010 at 8:00 PM at Boston College (Robsham Theatre), Chestnut Hill, MA. The concert will feature internationally renowned pianist Geri Allen, a noted interpreter of the music of Mary Lou Williams, together with narrator Father Peter F. O’Brien, S.J., who was Mary Lou’s long-time friend and manager and now serves as Executive Director of the Mary Lou Williams Foundation. Joining the celebration will be two Boston College ensembles: BC bOp!, the jazz ensemble of Boston College (Sebastian Bonaiuto, Director) and the Mary Lou Williams Centennial Choir of Boston College (JoJo David, Director). $20 ($15 advance purchase by April 30). Box office: 617-552-4002.

The May 9 concert is the only major Mary Lou Williams centennial tribute currently planned in New England.

Pianist and composer Mary Lou Williams is one of our great American composers, an African American who rose to prominence in the pre-Civil Rights / pre-Women Rights era when female big band composer-arrangers were rare. Called The First Lady of Jazz, Williams wrote for and performed with Andy Kirk's Twelve Clouds of Joy (one of the leading Territory Bands of the 1920s and 30s), and she composed for illustrious orchestras including Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman and Dizzy Gillespie. She gave the premiere of her masterwork, the twelve-movement Zodiac Suite, in Carnegie Hall. Following a spiritual crisis in the 1950s, Ms. Williams became a Roman Catholic in 1957 and began to compose sacred music, including Black Christ of the Andes, in honor of St. Martin de Porres, and three complete masses, the most famous being Mary Lou's Mass, performed at the Vatican.

THE AARDVARK JAZZ ORCHESTRA
is managed exclusively by AMERICAS MUSICWORKS
Rebecca DeLamotte, managing director, 617-776-8778, delamotte-amw@comcast.net
www.americasmusicworks.com
www.aardvarkjazz.com