Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue jazz up the Sherman Theater in Stroudsburg on June 15
From a press release:
Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue will bring their hard-edged funk, hip-hop beats, rock dynamics, and improvisation in the great tradition of jazz to the Sherman Theater in Stroudsburg on Thursday, June 15 at 8 p.m.
Tickets, which are $36 for standing general admission and $44 for balcony seats, are on sale now and available through the Sherman Theater box office (524 Main St., Stroudsburg), online at shermantheater.com and ticketmaster.com, and all Ticketmaster outlets. VIP boxes and sky boxes are available for this show and include eight tickets (VIP box) or 12 tickets (sky box), a fruit and cheese platter, and waitstaff. To purchase box seats, call the theater at 570-420-2808.
Part Jimi Hendrix, part James Brown and all New Orleans, Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews is the bandleader and frontman of Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue, recently signing with Blue Note Records to make his debut album for the iconic jazz label, “Parking Lot Symphony,” this April ahead of his appearance at the 2017 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, where he has inherited the festival’s prestigious closing set in the legacy of great New Orleans artists like the Neville Brothers and Professor Longhair. Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue are currently out on an extensive tour opening for Red Hot Chili Peppers, including three sold-out shows at both Madison Square Garden in New York City and the Staples Center in Los Angeles. A 2011 Grammy Award nominee, his virtuosity and high-energy live shows have drawn unanimous raves worldwide.
Troy Andrews was born into a well-known New Orleans musical family in 1986. His grandfather, Jessie Hill, was a locally popular R&B recording artist. His older brother, James “12” Andrews, was a successful jazz trumpeter who was also an early mentor. Andrews began playing music at a very early age and was playing professionally at the age of five. He mastered trombone, trumpet, and drums, eventually choosing the trombone as his principal instrument and thus picking up his nickname. So advanced was he that, at the age of eight, a club in the city’s Tremé district, where he was born and raised, was named Trombone Shorts in his honor.
Andrews became a member of the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts’ musical education program for high school students; other graduates included Harry Connick, Jr., Nicholas Payton, and Wynton and Branford Marsalis. At NOCCA, Andrews took music theory, ear training, and instrumental instruction courses under Clyde Kerr, Jr., and Kent Jordan, among others. In 2003, he was one of five young musicians chosen as the subject for a PBS television documentary and also performed on the network’s nationally broadcast tribute to Louis Armstrong, directed by Wynton Marsalis. Outside his hometown, Andrews has appeared with the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra and has performed with U2 and Green Day. He has also traveled extensively overseas, playing concerts and festivals in Cuba and Europe; he has appeared at the Vienna Jazz Festival, the North Sea Jazz Festival, and the Istanbul Jazz Festival.
As a recording artist, Andrews has appeared on “Global Song of Kids,” a collection of children’s songs played in the style of New Orleans marching bands released in Japan. His first recording under his own name, “Swingin’ Gate,” was issued in 2002 and featured several of his own compositions; it was acclaimed by jazz critics. This was followed in 2004 by “The Same Pocket, Vol. 1” (by the BlueBrass Project) and “12 & Shorty” (with his brother James’ band). In 2005, Treme Records released “The End of the Beginning” (by the Troy Andrews Quintet) and “Orleans & Claiborne” (by Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews & Orleans Avenue), and four volumes of his performances at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival entitled “Live at Jazz Fest” 2004, 2006, 2007, and 2008. He also appeared on the club hit “Tufflove” on Galactic’s “Ya-Ka-May” in 2010 before releasing his Verve Records debut, “Backatown” (on which he not only plays trombone but also sings and plays trumpet, keyboards, drums, and other percussion), under the Trombone Shorty moniker.
“Backatown” was greeted by nearly universal critical and commercial acclaim – it hit the Billboard jazz chart at No. 1 and remained there for nine straight weeks, and it was in the Top 10 for over six months; the album was nominated for a Grammy Award in the Best Contemporary Jazz Album category. Andrews and his band toured worldwide to support it, knocking out sold-out crowds all over the globe with their high-energy meld of styles, opening for Jeff Beck and Dave Matthews, as well as playing the Bonnaroo and Bumbershoot festival stages along the way. Andrews also appeared, as himself, in several episodes of the HBO television series “Tréme.”
Taking no time off, Shorty and Orleans Avenue recorded “For True” during brief breaks from the road. Released on Sept. 13, 2011, it was produced by Ben Ellman and George Drakoulias and featured a host of guest appearances from Jeff Beck, Ledisi, Lenny Kravitz, Kid Rock, Warren Haynes, Ivan and Cyril Neville, and the Rebirth Brass Band, among others. While Andrews spent most of the next year and a half touring in support of the album, over the next two years he also became an in-demand guest sideman, appearing on albums by the Soul Rebels Brass Band, the Zac Brown Band, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Cee Lo Green, Rod Stewart, and Robert Randolph.
In 2012 he appeared at the White House with numerous artists as part of the PBS documentary “In Performance at the White House: Red, White & Blues.” Andrews partnered with New Orleans’ mayor Mitch Landrieu to create The Trombone Shorty Foundation, which donated new instruments to public schools. Later, in partnership with Tulane University, the program evolved into the After School Academy for aspiring musicians. In September of 2013, he released his third Verve offering, “Say That to Say This.”
Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue were named halftime performers for the 63rd Annual NBA All-Star Game, where they performed a medley of their own songs and as well as hits by Dr. John; Gary Clark, Jr.; Janelle Monae; and Earth Wind & Fire, all of whom performed live with Andrews and his band on TNT. In 2015, he performed with Queen Latifah and Usher at the White House, toured Europe in support of Foo Fighters, and then returned to the White House to appear at the National Christmas Tree Lighting. Andrews also made his feature film debut in 2015, using his trombone to voice the iconic sound of the adult characters in the animated box office smash “The Peanuts Movie.”
In 2016, Andrews was named to Forbes’ “30 Under 30” Class of 2016 for music, along with Selena Gomez, The Weeknd, and Jon Batiste, and performed (yet again) at the White House as part of International Jazz Day. His illustrated autobiography for young readers, “Trombone Shorty,” was named a 2016 Caldecott Honor Book by the American Library Association. Trombone Shorty is passing down his musical knowledge and keeping the New Orleans brass band tradition alive through his own Trombone Shorty Foundation and Music Academy, and since 2014 has worked as a “Turnaround Artist” with the Turnaround Arts Initiative, a program that helps low-performing schools improve through intensive arts programs.
