Today, Blue Engine Records releases the first recording of Blues Symphony (Symphony No. 2), an innovative and colossal work from Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Wynton Marsalis. In the hands of The Philadelphia Orchestra under the direction of celebrated conductor Cristian Măcelaru, Blues Symphony (Marsalis’s second symphony) takes the 12-bar blues and explodes it into a lyrical, kaleidoscopic history of American music.
Blues Symphony (Symphony No. 2) is available globally on all digital platforms from Blue Engine Records.
The symphony’s seven movements are each infused with different influences—a ragtime stomp here, a habanera rhythm there—and, collectively, they take listeners on a sonic journey through America’s revolutionary era, the early beginnings of jazz in New
Orleans, and even a big city soundscape that serves as a nod to the Great Migration. This 2019 performance, recorded live in Verizon Hall at Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, builds upon the legacies of Scott Joplin, James P. Johnson, George Gershwin, and other American masters, demonstrating the genius and breadth of Marsalis’s imagination.
“The blues helps you remember back before the troubles on hand and in mind,” says Marsalis, “and they carry you on the wings of angels to a timeless higher ground.” With the exquisite palette provided by The Philadelphia Orchestra, Blues Symphony (Symphony No. 2) is a triumphant ode to the power of the blues and the scope of America’s musical heritage.
Blues Symphony (Symphony No. 2) movements:
I. Born in Hope
II. Swimming in Sorrow
III. Reconstruction Rag
IV. Southwestern Shakedown
V. Big City Breaks
VI. Danzón y Mambo, Choro y Samba
VII. Dialog in Democracy
About Blue Engine Records
Blue Engine Records, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s platform that makes its vast archive of recorded concerts available to jazz audiences everywhere, launched on June 30, 2015. Blue Engine Records releases new studio and live recordings as well as archival recordings from Jazz at Lincoln Center’s performance history that date back to 1987 and are part of the R. Theodore Ammon Archives and Music Library. Since the institution’s founding in 1987, each year’s programming is conceived and developed by Managing and Artistic Director Wynton Marsalis with a vision toward building a comprehensive library of iconic and wide-ranging compositions that, taken together, make up a canon of music. These archives include accurate, complete charts for the compositions – both old and new – performed each season. Coupled with consistently well-executed and recorded music performed by Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, this archive has grown to include thousands of songs from hundreds of concert dates. The launch of Blue Engine is aligned with Jazz at Lincoln Center’s efforts to cultivate existing jazz fans worldwide and turn new audiences onto jazz. For more information on Blue Engine Records, visit blueenginerecords.org.
Leadership support for Blue Engine Records is provided in part by the Arnhold Family and Jay Pritzker Foundation.
Generous support is provided by Helen and Robert Appel, Diana and Joseph DiMenna, Leonard and Louise Riggio, and Lisa Schiff.