Kurt Elling

By
April 2022 View more

April 10 at 6 p.m.
Wentz Concert Hall
171 E. Chicago, Naperville
Tickets $65–$75
630.637.7469
finearts.northcentralcollege.edu 

Music and current events
It would be a dereliction of duty for me not to engage the political moment in my music (specifically in several songs on the 2020 recording Secrets are the Best Stories), given its vast challenges, concerns, and the justifiable anxieties of my audience. There’s just too much at stake for my children and yours, for democracy and for our very survival. 

Looking back on life and music … so far
I’m grateful that I still have the great fortune to have had a career in music at all—that a smallish but not insignificant number of people around the world have trusted me to sing for
them and have grown to support my work over the years. I’m also incredibly grateful to still be married to the girl of my dreams. Throw my glorious and kind children into the mix, and you have a man with no legitimate complaints.

Not slowing down
I hope to make a proper big band record or two, and record—at least—the music to The Big Blind, a staged noir musical I’ve written with my friend Phil Galdston. I also want to make at least one record with Bill Charlap and to record again with Branford Marsalis. There are far too many items on my to-do list to slow down at this point. 

Photo by Cory Dewald