Jazz legends Hancock, Shorter to perform in India

New Delhi, Jan 10: Two living legends of jazz, pianist Herbie Hancock and saxophonist Wayne Shorter, will be in India to promote HIV/AIDS awareness as they will perform between January 11-17 in New Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata.

These performances are being supported by the United States Department of State and American Centres, which has in the past managed to get jazz singer Al Jarreau, guitarist Earl Klugh and Grammy-nominated saxophonist Kenny Garrett to tour India.

The duo, backed by nine musicians from the US-based Thelonius Monk Institute of Jazz, will give concerts, hold master classes with young Indian musicians and engage in outreach activities to promote the noble cause.

They will perform at the Siri Fort auditorium in the capital on January 16, besides mesmerising the jazz lovers at the National Center for Performing Arts on January 13 in Mumbai and at Dalhousie Institute in Kolkata the next day.

Hancock, 66, is one of the most influential jazz composers and pianists of all times and won an Academy Award for the original soundtrack for Round Midnight (1986). He has won 10 Grammies between 1983 and 2004 for works like Rockit and My Ship.

Jazz composer and saxophonist Shorter, 73, has played alongside Hancock during the 1960s in the Miles Davis Quintet and has appeared in Joni Mitchell's records in the 1990s. His album High Life received a Grammy for the Best Contemporary Jazz Album in 1997.

UNI