Program Description
Event Details
Please join us for a live musical celebration of Black History Month with The Brian Torff Group, a collective dedicated to revitalizing the essence of American music. In a program that blends original songs with classic Delta Blues, it will highlight the profound impact of Black music on American culture. Torff's engaging on-stage stories draw from his extensive research on music and race in the Deep South, emphasizing the critical role of Black Music in Blues, Jazz, Country, Rock and Pop. The group will play new interpretations of classic artists such as Bessie Smith, Robert Johnson, B.B. King, Mose Allison and Elvis Presley.
Joining Torff, who will play guitar, harmonica, bass and vocals, will be Wes Lewis and Nathan Edwards on saxophones, and Avery Collins on drums.
Brian Q. Torff
A musical career takes many surprise turns. After a career as a jazz bassist and composer that began in the mid 1970s, Brian Torff now creates music as a songwriter, guitarist and vocalist. He has played with Frank Sinatra, George Shearing, Mary Lou Williams, and Erroll Garner among others. Torff now focuses on acoustic guitar, harmonica, loop pedal, and his upright stick bass to create a different sound. As a Professor of Music at Fairfield University since 1993, his research trips to the deep South have impacted the lyrical stories.
Brian Torff has written a jazz memoir, In Love With Voices, and his most recent book, Seize the Beat: The Evolution of American Music is used in his classes on American popular music. Torff explains, “I love working with words, so songwriting was a logical next step.” Drawing on his experience in jazz, blues, and rock, combined with a country-folk influence, Brian Torff feels that “we need to create new musical categories.”
Torff has performed at the Hollywood Bowl, Carnegie Hall, the White House, the Royal Albert Hall, the NBC Tonight Show, and PBS. English critic Harry Giltrap wrote of his bass playing, “Torff is a self-contained orchestra.”
Elm Street Books will be selling copies of Seize the Beat: The Evolution of American Music, which Brian will sign after the program. A portion of the proceeds goes to Wilton Library.
Registration is required.