2019 Gala Benefit Concert Valerie Simpson
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2019 Gala Benefit Concert Sponsorship Opportunities Featuring Valerie Simpson World renowned recording artist, song writer, producer Camille Thurman Tenor saxophonist, vocalist, band leader Honorees Benny Golson GRAMMY nominated saxophonist, composer, arranger Legends of Jazz Harlem School of the Arts Jazz & Community Leadership The Hon. Adriano Espaillat U.S. Representative Special Recognition Sullivan and Cromwell Corporate Leadership & Community Service Special Recognition Wednesday, June 12, 2019 7:30pm - 9:00pm City College Center for the Arts & Aaron Davis Hall West 135th Street & Convent Avenue (129 Convent Avenue) 1 Dear Friends, We are pleased to invite you to join the National Jazz Museum in Harlem at our sixth annual Gala Benefit Concert. We hope you will partner with us as a sponsor of this exciting event. The National Jazz Museum in Harlem is a thriving center for jazz that brings together worldwide audiences to celebrate this quintessential American Music. This year, as always, we look forward to celebrating with you, our honorees, highly acclaimed guest artists. Our mission is to preserve, promote and present jazz by inspiring knowledge, appreciation, and the celebration of jazz locally, nationally and internationally. Education is central to what we do. We offer year-round educational programs for students, seniors and the public. Each year, we produce and present nearly 100 free and low-cost events in New York City, making us a hub for live performances, exhibits and education programs. We feature jazz musicians and scholars renowned in the field. We are home to the widely acclaimed Savory Collection, which includes more than 100 hours of live recordings of jazz legends made from New York City radio broadcasts aired between 1935 and 1941. Our membership is going global with exclusive content that reaches out to everyone in the jazz community. Please consider joining our growing community of supporters by sponsoring the National Jazz Museum in Harlem. Sincerely, Jonathan Batiste Co-artistic Director Christian McBride Co-artistic Director Timothy L. Porter Chair 2018 Benefit Gala Concert Tracy Hyter-Suffern Executive Director Board of Trustees Co-artistic Directors Timothy L. Porter, Chair Jonathan Batiste Jonathan Scheuer, Christian McBride Vice Chair Richard S. Taffet, Secretary Mark A. Willis, Treasurer Staff Ken Burns Tracy Hyter-Suffern, Executive Director Neal Dittersdorf Loren Schoenberg, Senior Scholar Wynton Marsalis Carla Eilo, Operations Manager Kenneth McIntyre Sam Ginsberg, Education Services Robert L. Nelson, Jr. Ryan Maloney, Dean Schomburg Director of Education & Programming Samuel Turvey Martin Mejia, Visitor Services 2 The National Jazz Museum in Harlem (NJMH) is a living “people’s” museum and active jazz presenter committed to keeping jazz present Programming and exciting. We offer immersive jazz experiences, year-round at our central Harlem location and partner venues across New York City. We are a creative hub for jazz that showcases musicians and composers who have contributed to and continue to develop this uniquely American art form. Our community jam sessions, emerging artist performances and special concerts with established musicians including NEA Jazz Masters spotlight Harlem’s significant role in the evolution of jazz. The Museum is a hub for live performance, exhibits and education. Our four core programs are Education, Jazz Is… Community Outreach & Performance, Collaborations & Partnerships, and Exhibits & Collections. Each year, we produce and present nearly 100 free and low-cost events in New York City, engage hundreds of professional jazz artists and reach nearly 20,000 people from around the world. We are also home to our widely acclaimed Savory Collection that includes more than 100 hours of live recordings of jazz legends made from New York City radio broadcasts previously unreleased between 1935 and 1941. PUBLIC PROGRAMS Jazz for Curious Listeners An in-depth look at jazz through conversations, lecture-demonstrations, film screenings, and interviews. Harlem Speaks An oral histories interview series with musicians, authors, and other individuals who reflect on Harlem’s rich history of jazz. Drop Me Off in Harlem We bring live music and conversation to local senior centers. EDUCATION Born in Harlem We engage teens and adults by looking at the musical and cultural innovations that were born in Harlem during the first half of the 20th century. Oom Bop Sh’bam A fun introduction to jazz, Oom Bop Sh’Bam uses improvisation, scat singing, and bebop to foster creativity, self-confidence, and self- expression, and is designed for students in grades K-5. Experience Harlem Education Series In-school residency program led by our teaching artists for 7th to 12th grade. National & International Outreach Our collaborations include Brigham Young University, Stanford University, and universities and festivals in Cuba and Poland. 3 “Everybody has the Blues. Everybody longs for meaning. Everybody needs to love and be loved. Everybody needs to clap Why Become a hands and be happy. Everybody longs for faith. In music, especially Sponsor? this broad category called Jazz, there is a stepping stone towards all of these.” Martin Luther King, Jr. • You will be in good company with previous sponsors and donors. • You will be supporting us in preserving, presenting and promoting the knowledge and appreciation of the most quintessential American music. • You will be supporting a cultural organization that celebrates Harlem as a cultural epicenter of jazz and African-American art. • Your sponsorship will help us bring arts education to over a thousand school children, including many coming from underserved communities. • You will be bringing us closer to achieving our goal of establishing a permanent home in Harlem for The National Jazz Museum. • Your sponsorship will be noticed by close to 700 people attending the gala, and over 10,000 people who are receiving our promotional materials. • You and your guests will have a great night out filled with world class entertainment. 4 PLATINUM LEVEL Sponsors Gala 2018 The National Jazz Museum in Harlem is grateful to our corporate and foundation sponsors for their generous support of our 2018 gala Jonathan Scheuer SILVER LEVEL SIGNATURE LEVEL 5 Valerie Simpson is half of the songwriting-performing- producing entity formerly known as Ashford and Simpson. Their Featured award winning collaborations began four decades ago and she, Artists along with her late husband Nick Ashford, have penned classic hits such as, “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough,” “You’re All I Need to Get By,” “Reach Out and Touch Somebody’s Hand,” “I’m Every Woman,” “Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing,” “Solid,” “Your Precious Love,” “I Don’t Need No Doctor” and “Let’s Go Get Stoned” among others. She serves on the board of the ASCAP Foundation where an award has been established to aid struggling songwriters called the REACH OUT AND TOUCH AWARD, which honors Nick Ashford. Valerie owns and runs a popular New York Westside Music Club and Restaurant called The Sugar Bar where young writers-singers-musicians have a platform to perform. Valerie has toured with Dave Koz as a special guest and this year with Paul Shaffer & the World’s Most Dangerous Band. Her Music is in constant demand and four Ashford & Simpson songs are now featured in the Broadway hit MOTOWN-The Musical, which is touring the country. “I’M EVERY WOMAN” is featured in THE BODYGUARD, the play, which is currently on tour. Most recently, Valerie, as performer, was also featured in New York’s CHICAGO, The Musical on Broadway for a limited engagement in the role of Mama Morton--adding yet a new, exciting dimension to a diversified career. 6 Benny Golson is an acclaimed musical artist who is at home in nearly every idiom of modern music. He is a composer, LEGENDS OF arranger, lyricist, producer and a saxophonist of world note. His JAZZ AWARD influence has had an impact on jazz, middle-of-the-road, and on motion pictures, television and records. Educated at Howard University, Mr. Golson began his jazz career in Philadelphia, his home, later shifting his activities to New York City where he began to gain fame as a saxophonist with bands such as those of as Dizzy Gillespie, Art Blakey, Earl Bostic, Lionel Hampton, Benny Goodman, The Farmer/Golson Jazztet and even his own group. He moved to Hollywood for a few years, at which time he wrote scores for major television shows, the Academy Awards, and feature films in Paris, France, and Germany. Mr. Golson also writes music for national radio and television spots for some of the major advertising agencies in the country. In 1987, the State Department sent him on a cultural tour of southeast Asia to New Zealand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Burma and Singapore, after which Philip Morris International sent him on assignment to Bangkok, Thailand to write music for the Bangkok Symphony Orchestra. In addition to being a lecturer at major universities, Mr. Golson is an international recording artist who has recorded over 30 albums under his own name and innumerable ones with other major artists. A great number of these major artists continue to eagerly record his songs, many of which have long since become jazz standards. 7 U.S. Representative Adriano Espaillat proudly represents New York’s Thirteenth Congressional District. He was Special sworn into office on January 3, 2017, during the 115th Congress. recognition Congressman Espaillat was born in the Dominican Republic in 1954 and came to the United States with his family when he was nine years old. He grew up in the Washington Heights neighborhood in New York City and is the first Dominican- American to serve in the United States Congress. Congressman Espaillat currently serves as a member of the influential U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee, the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, and the House Select Committee on Small Business. He is a member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) and serves in a leadership role as CHC Freshman Representative to the Democratic Caucus.