Carl Allen’s Art Blakey Tribute, George Coleman Trio, Fred Hersch, Lakecia Benjamin

Carl Allen’s jazz bonafides are indisputable—as a young drummer out of William Paterson University he earned a spot in Freddie Hubbard’s band, and would go on to play with the saxophonists George Coleman and Phil Woods (among others), and serve as the Artistic Director of Jazz Studies at the Juilliard School. The quintet he brings to SummerStage—featuring Jeremy Pelt, JD Allen, Eric Reed, and Peter Washington—pays tribute to one of his heroes, the legendary drummer Art Blakey. Allen is joined by NEA Jazz Master and one of the most respected musicians out of the hard-bop era George Coleman and his trio, the multiple GRAMMY Award nominee pianist Fred Hersch, who has been proclaimed as “the most arrestingly innovative pianist in jazz” by Vanity Fair, and the saxophonist Lakecia Benjamin, who has played with the likes of Missy Elliot, Alicia Keys, Stevie Wonder, Macy Gray, the Roots, and Anita Baker.