Detroit has always been a hotbed of jazz artists. This year's Jazz Festival moves them center stage

What would the Detroit Jazz Festival be without its local musicians? 

Fortunately that's a question that doesn’t have to be answered here in Detroit, since this city not only plays hosts to this worldwide draw, but supplies much of the festival's talent. Chris Collins, the Detroit Jazz Festival Foundation's president and artistic director, has always put an emphasis on highlighting Detroit’s premier talent through its Detroit Signature Artist Series, which features local artists performing on the festival’s main stages and opens them up to an international audience. That's before you get to the festival’s rich educational components, which ultimately support aspiring musicians across the region. 

Since 2007, the Wayne State University Department of Music has partnered with the Detroit Jazz Festival for the J.C. Heard Jazz Week@Wayne, a one-week workshop that provides high school students with an intensive jazz educational experience tuition free. There is also the jazz festival’s youth vocal and collegiate combo competition, which celebrates the best of Michigan’s high school, college and university jazz programs. Each year in August, the Dirty Dog Jazz Café hosts the competitions and the winning band and vocalist gets to perform at the festival. 

So when festivalgoers venture downtown this Labor Day weekend, they won't just be treated to performances from national artists like drummer and artist-in-residence Brian Blade, saxophonist Joshua Redman, pianist Billy Childs and vocalist Carmen Lundy. They will be immersed in Detroit’s true jazz scene through artists like saxophonist Wendell Harrison and his band Tribe, drummer Sean Dobbins Ensemble, professor Leonard King, and trumpeter Anthony Stanco, who is making his debut as a leader at the festival.

Stanco is one of the young lions keeping Detroit’s musical lineage alive through his unique spin on classic jazz. He’s been on the scene for a while and in addition to touring nationally and locally, he’s also on the music faculty at Michigan State University where he is raising up the next generation of musicians. Stanco spoke with Model D about his upcoming experience at the festival, his new album, and what it’s like standing on the shoulders of trumpet giants like Marcus Belgrave.

Model D: The Detroit Jazz Festival is less than a few weeks away. How did the opportunity come about to perform at the festival and is this the first time you've led a band there?

Anthony Stanco: I've been a part of the festival in some capacity, but this will be my first time leading my own ensemble at the festival. I grew up going there as a kid so being a part of it means so much to me. Just being from Detroit, that was what we always looked forward to is Jazz Festival weekend. I just released my third album as a leader called Stanco’s Time and I just thought it would be a perfect time to present the music at the jazz festival.

Who are some of the artists that you're excited to see at the festival this year?
   
One of the biggest ones I'm really focusing on is my student at Michigan State. His name is Jauron Perry. He just won the Detroit Jazz Festival combo competition.
He's performing at the festival the day before me, and so I'm super excited about that because the Michigan State Jazz Band is playing that day too. I’m going to be a Spartan all weekend and be supporting one of my students. He won the Michigan Jazz Festival solo competition just this past month and so now to have won the Detroit Jazz Festival combo competition, he's just really on fire.

You're assistant professor of trumpet at Michigan State. What are some of the lessons you learned early on that you are now imparting onto your students?

I think the biggest thing is teaching through action. Marcus Belgrave taught me how to do it on the bandstand. I worked professionally with Marcus, and he gave me my first gigs, so I'm able to do that for my students as well. I’m performing a lot with them throughout this Michigan tour that we had and just getting them on the bandstand, learning as we play. It’s a hands-on experience. That’s what Marcus did with me, that’s what Professor Rodney Whitaker did with me. And just getting on that bandstand with your students means more than you can do in the classroom. 

I just had a full student band perform with me at GR Noir last Saturday. So, these students are coming up through the ranks with us. The bandstand is a safe place to make mistakes. We're trying to master this music, but you can't really do that without making some mistakes.

You went to the Manhattan School of Music. Talk to me about playing in New York and how it compares or doesn't to Detroit's music scene?

I did things kind of backwards. I went to Manhattan School of Music first for two years of my undergraduate career and then I transferred to Michigan State where I received my bachelors and masters. And then I started teaching there in 2021.

Being in New York, which is another hub for jazz, did you get a chance to perform at the clubs there and/or immerse yourself in the New York jazz scene?

For me I was a student at that time. So, when I was there, I was like 18-19 years old.  I learned a lot, but it was mostly me watching and soaking everything in. I was going to a lot of clubs and the class of students that I was with was pretty outstanding. Me and pianist Christian Sands were freshmen together. Linda Oh, a great bass player was doing her master’s there. Pianist Sullivan Fortner was there.  I was more observing, and I learned so much from my peers.  I was even hanging with John Baptiste. He was at Juilliard at the time, and we'd hang, and I’d go sit and watch him get piano lessons. So just being around those guys, those were my lessons. Those two years when I was there as a student, I realized that I needed really tight knit mentors, and I knew I was going to get that at Michigan State. 

Detroit is a jazz mecca, home to such an extraordinary legacy of artists and trumpeters like Marcus Belgrave, Thad Jones, and Donald Byrd. What does it mean to be carrying on their legacy? 

It's huge. It really is. We have a huge trumpet legacy here. I grew up with trumpeter Kris Johnson and I remember growing up basically trying to stalk trumpeter Dwight Adams (laughing). Kris would come pick me up and we would go and hang and try to go see where Dwight was and play with him, Rayse Biggs or John Douglas. These guys are the musicians I was looking up to as a trumpet player.

And now there's just a whole slew of new ones coming up like Andrew Brown and Jauron Perry at Michigan State. They're really out there playing a lot and it's just really cool to see that. It’s definitely a lineage that I'm proud to be a part of. There’s no shortage of great trumpet players here in Detroit and they keep you on your toes, that's for sure. 

You have a great lineup for your new record Stanco’s Time. Talk to us about the new album and what's next for you musically? 

It’s great because I get to perform with a lot of my faculty at Michigan State like Randy Napoleon, Xavier Davis, Rodney Whitaker and then our recent graduate from the Michigan State program, David Alvarez III. I feel like the guys on the record, this is like my desert island band. If I had to play with one guitarist, one bassist, one pianist, one drummer that you could only play with forever, this would be the band. The whole record was basically meant to embrace the music of the past, this golden era of jazz in the 1940s and '50s, but also just trying to find some new avenues of creating within those constructs.

It's 12 tracks, there's six originals and six standards. The standards are by these bebop architects like Ted Dameron, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk. There's even a Duke Ellington standard on there. So, the standards that I did pick were specifically to even further that kind of message of the trumpet.

It feels great to have recorded the music and be able to present it, and we even have a recording session slated for early 2025. We're going to move it up forward a little bit and do some hard bop kind of stuff.  As a composer, I’m trying to emulate some of these different styles and make it my own. It’s been a fun challenge and the band is up for it. So, I’m looking forward to doing it again.