Jazz on a High Floor in the Afternoon:
Tiger Trio

Floor 8

Curated by celebrated jazz pianist, composer, and visual artist Jason Moran and Whitney performance curator Adrienne Edwards, Jazz on a High Floor in the Afternoon is a series of live in-gallery performances presented over nine weekends. The series features cross-generational artists performing within Moran’s three mixed-media “set sculptures”—STAGED: Savoy Ballroom 1 (2015), STAGED: Three Deuces (2015), and STAGED: Slugs’ Saloon (2018). Each installation pays homage to an iconic New York jazz venue.

Tiger Trio, the union of pianist Myra Melford, bassist Joëlle Léandre, and flutist Nicole Mitchell, began during Melford’s two-year Building Demand for the Arts Residency, funded by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco. The trio debuted at the 2015 New Frequencies Fest: Jazz@YBCA, which was the culmination of the residency. Melford and Mitchell are both recipients of the Doris Duke Performing Arts Award and the Alpert Award in the Arts. Melford, a professor at University of California, Berkeley, is a widely celebrated pianist and composer. Mitchell, also a composer, is the former first woman chair of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians and recognized by The New York Times for her "Afrofuturist vision." Mitchell, a professor at the University of Pittsburgh, is the new leader of their Jazz Studies program. Double bassist, vocalist and composer, Léandre was Creative Associate at the Center for Performing Arts in Buffalo, NY, working with Morton Feldman and John Cage. Léandre was a recipient of the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst Scholarship and the Villa Kujoyama Scholarship, and in the early 1990s, she co-founded the feminist improvising trio Les Diaboliques, with Irène Schweizer and Maggie Nicols. Tiger Trio has two recordings—Unleashed and Map of Liberation—on the Parisian Rogue Art label.

Friday, January 3
5 & 7 pm*

Saturday, January 4
2 & 4 pm

Tickets are required ($25 adults; $18 members, students, seniors, and visitors with a disability) and include Museum admission. 

*Tickets for performances during Pay-What-You-Wish hours (Fridays, 7–10 pm) will be distributed day-of, on a first come, first served basis at the Museum starting at 7 pm.

See all performances from the Jazz on A High Floor in the Afternoon series.