St. Cecilia Music Center brings GRAMMY® and Tony Awards® Winner Dee Dee Bridgewater with pianist Bill Charlap to perform on March 10, 2022

St. Cecilia Music Center brings Tony award-winning actress and GRAMMY® winning jazz singer Dee Dee Bridgewater to the Royce Auditorium stage on March 10, 2022. Dee Dee Bridgewater will share the stage with GRAMMY® winning jazz pianist Bill Charlap.

Dee Dee Bridgewater over the course of a multifaceted career spanning four decades, has ascended to the upper echelon of vocalists, putting her unique spin on standards, as well as re-envisioning jazz classics. Bridgewater, a fearless voyager, explorer, pioneer and keeper of jazz tradition is a three-time GRAMMY® winner and a Tony Award winner. She hosted a show called JazzSet for 23 years on NPR, is a UN Goodwill Ambassador and is the recipient of an NEA Jazz Masters Fellows Award.Bridgewater just released a new CD called Memphis: Yes, I'm Ready in September 2021.  She says about the new album, “These were songs I listened to on the famous Black radio station WDIA, where my own father, Matthew Garrett, was a young on-air DJ with the moniker ‘Matt the Platter Cat.’ I was born in Memphis, but my family migrated north to Flint, Michigan when I was 3 years old. The South has always remained buried in me and coming back for this recording project has brought me full circle in my life.”

Bill Charlap, one of the world’s premier jazz pianists has performed and recorded with many leading artists of our time, ranging from jazz masters Phil Woods and Wynton Marsalis to singers Tony Bennett and Barbra Streisand. In 2016, Charlap won the GRAMMY® for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album. Since 1997, he has led the Bill Charlap Trio, now recognized as one of the leading groups in jazz.

St. Cecilia Music Center Executive / Artistic Director Cathy Holbrook states “We are thrilled to bring the amazing Dee Dee Bridgewater to St. Cecilia Music Center to hear her gorgeous voice and unique spin on beloved jazz classics and her own new music “Memphis”. It will certainly be a special evening to see Dee Dee and Bill Charlap performing together within our intimate Royce Auditorium setting.” 

Tickets to experience Dee Dee Bridgewater and Bill Charlap together in concert are $50 and $55 and can be purchased online at www.scmc-online.org or by calling St. Cecilia Music Center at 616-459-2224. 

NOTE: SCMC currently requires proof of fully vaccinated status, or a negative COVID test taken within 72 hours, to attend a concert at the SCMC venue. Attendees need to bring photo ID and proof of vaccination, or a negative test, the night of a concert. Note: Home tests are not accepted.

All patrons are required to wear a mask for the full duration of their time in the building, throughout the concert. 

If you have tickets to an upcoming performance and are unwilling or unable to abide by this policy, please contact the SCMC box office for a refund at [email protected] a minimum of 48 hours prior to the concert date.

Dee Dee Bridgewater Bio

The celebrated actress and singer is world-renowned. She was born in Memphis and then lived in Flint Michigan throughout her early years. Over the course of a multifaceted career spanning four decades, Grammy and Tony Award-winning Jazz giant Dee Dee Bridgewater has ascended to the upper echelon of vocalists, putting her unique spin on standards, as well as taking intrepid leaps of faith in re-envisioning jazz classics.  Ever the fearless voyager, explorer, pioneer and keeper of tradition, the three-time Grammy-winner most recently won the GRAMMY® for Best Jazz Vocal Album for Eleanora Fagan (1915-1959): To Billie With Love From Dee Dee.

Bridgewater’s career has always bridged musical genres. She earned her first professional experience as a member of the legendary Thad Jones/Mel Louis Big Band, and throughout the 70’s she performed with such jazz notables as Max Roach, Sonny Rollins, Dexter Gordon and Dizzy Gillespie. After a foray into the pop world during the 1980s, she relocated to Paris and began to turn her attention back to Jazz.   Bridgewater began self-producing with her 1993 album Keeping Tradition (Polydor/Verve) and created DDB records in 2006 when she signed with the Universal Music Group as a producer (Bridgewater produces all of her own CDs).   Releasing a series of critically acclaimed CD’s, all but one, including her wildly successful double Grammy Award-winning tribute to Ella Fitzgerald, Dear Ella - have received Grammy nominations.  Artist Theo Croker is signed to DDB Records and Irvin Mayfield, and the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra also recorded a project with Dee Dee released by her label in 2014.

Bridgewater also pursued a parallel career in musical theater, winning a Tony Award for her role as “Glinda” in The Wiz in 1975. Having recently completed a run as the lead role of Billie Holiday in the off-Broadway production of Lady Day, her other theatrical credits include Sophisticated Ladies, Black Ballad, Carmen, Cabaret and the Off-Broadway and West End Productions of Lady Day, for which Bridgewater received the British Laurence Olivier Nomination for Best Actress in a Musical.

As a Goodwill Ambassador to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Bridgewater continues to appeal for international solidarity to finance global grassroots projects in the fight against world hunger. She is currently on tour worldwide in support of “Memphis,” her new CD, and in April of 2017 was the recipient of an NEA Jazz Masters Fellows Award with honors bestowed at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. 

Bill Charlap Bio

Grammy award winning pianist Bill Charlap has performed with many of the leading artists of our time including Phil Woods, Tony Bennett, Gerry Mulligan, Wynton Marsalis, Freddy Cole, and Houston Person. Born in New York City, Charlap began playing the piano at age three. His father was Broadway composer Moose Charlap, whose credits include Peter Pan, and his mother is singer Sandy Stewart, who toured with Benny Goodman, and was a regular on the Perry Como show. She earned a 1963 Grammy nomination for her recording of “My Coloring Book." In 2005, Charlap and Stewart released the acclaimed CD, Love Is Here to Stay (Blue Note).

In 1997, Charlap formed his trio with bassist Peter Washington and drummer Kenny Washington, now recognized as one of the leading groups in jazz. In 2000, he was signed to Blue Note Records and received two Grammy Award nominations, for Somewhere: The Songs of Leonard Bernstein and The Bill Charlap Trio: Live at the Village Vanguard. He is known for his interpretations of American popular song. Time magazine wrote, “Bill Charlap approaches a song the way a lover approaches his beloved…no matter how imaginative or surprising his take on a song is, he invariably zeroes in on its essence.” In 2016, Tony Bennett & Bill Charlap: The Silver Lining, The Songs of Jerome Kern, was awarded a Grammy for Best Traditional Pop Album. In April, the Bill Charlap Trio released, Notes from New York, their debut recording for the Impulse label. Alan Morrison's five-star review in Down Beat stated that the new recording is "a masterclass in class."
 
In 2019, Charlap will be celebrating his 15th year as Artistic Director of New York City’s Jazz in July Festival at 92Y. He has produced concerts for Jazz at Lincoln Center, New Jersey Performing Arts Center, Chicago Symphony Center, and the Hollywood Bowl. Charlap is married to renowned jazz pianist and composer Renee Rosnes, and the two artists often collaborate in a duo piano setting. In 2010 Charlap and Rosnes released Double Portrait (Blue Note). Bill Charlap is currently the Director of Jazz Studies at William Paterson University in Wayne, New Jersey. 

Tickets for St. Cecilia Music Center 2022 Season

Single tickets** for Jazz, Chamber and Folk series concerts be purchased by phone at 616-459-2224 or online at www.scmc-online.org. Series tickets are also available for Winterfest Jazz Festival with Christian McBride and Friends, February 24 - 26. If SCMC can offer post-concert CD-signing receptions, all ticketholders may be able to meet some of the artists and obtain signed CDs of their releases. More about available receptions with artists will be announced prior to each of the concert dates.

Jazz Series Single Tickets 

Dee Dee Bridgewater & Bill Charlap

Thursday, March 10, 2022

A section $55

B section $50

Delfeayo Marsalis and the Uptown Jazz Orchestra

Thursday, April 14, 2022

A section $50

B section $45

Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center Single Tickets – Upcoming Concerts 

The Jazz Effect

Thursday, March 31, 2022

A section $45

B section $40

Folk Series Single Tickets – Upcoming Concerts

Shawn Colvin

Thursday, May 12, 2022

A section $45

B section $40

VIP tix $125

Judy Collins

Wednesday, May 18, 2022

A section $65

B section $55

St. Cecilia Music Center’s mission is to promote the study, appreciation and

performance of music in order to enrich the lives of West Michigan residents. 

The Center fulfills this mission by 

presenting visiting world-class artists in concert, 

providing music education for all ages through our School of Music and 

preserving a historic building for musical activities and community events

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