Jon Batiste has been a household name since 2015, but he's seemingly just now arriving as an honest-to-goodness star.
By the time he took the stage at a small auditorium at Lincoln Center on June 17, he had been up for a scarily long time — beginning with an early appearance on "The Today Show" that morning. Still, Batiste's natural charisma was undimmed. Almost immediately, the beyond-media-trained musician laid waste to the N95-ed audience — and all it took was a quick shimmy and a gleaming grin.
If all Batiste did at the New York Performing Arts Library was smile and dance and wave, it would have amounted to an Instagrammable moment, at the very least. Instead, the house was in for an uncommonly deep Q&A and performance, to kick off the GRAMMY Museum's "A New York Evening With…" series presented by City National Bank and in partnership with the City of New York Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment. (It'll run until the end of 2022; click here for more details.)
Speaking with the GRAMMY Museum's Chief Curator and VP of Curatorial Affairs, Jasen Emmons, Batiste held forth about his childhood, family life, and constant potpourri of creative projects — which spans everything from film to TV to Carnegie Hall to lower-key collaborations. Batiste followed it up with an audience Q&A and then a livewire, seemingly improvisatory set on piano and voice, threading his GRAMMY-winning originals with standards germane to Black America.
*Jon Batiste speaking with the GRAMMY Museum’s Jasen Emmons. Photo: John Lamparski/Getty Images*
Back to all those projects for a second. How, exactly, does Batiste juggle it all? The words "frontburner" and "backburner" came up several times. His American Symphony, coming up at Carnegie was on the backburner for years until it was on the front. A good-intentioned request from an audience member to work in Broadway? "I've never really decided I want to focus on that on the front burner," he replied. "I think it has to be the right project."
Elsewhere in the hour-long talk, Batiste rhapsodized about his hometown of New Orleans ("We also have this incredible family that is musical, and this incredible city that's musical, and everybody plays"), revealed that he sweats over lyrics ("That's the hardest part, in that it takes the most time") and decried the notion of "world music" ("I want to abolish that, actually").
On top of all that, he recalled meeting Stephen Colbert for the first time and described the philosophy he brought to the Pixar film Soul, which he and other blue-chip jazz musicians like Herbie Hancock, Terri Lyne Carrington and Aaron Diehl chipped into. "It was a real labor of love to really make it right, make it feel authentic," Batiste said "We really went for it."
Stars at Batiste's level can be inaccessible, an entertainment module more than an approachable person. Batiste is the opposite. The Q&A radiated love for his family, roots, and future friends; his old piano teacher was even in the audience. And the brief set Batiste performed afterward didn't feel predetermined or prepackaged; it felt like a genuine expression in the moment.
Weaving originals like "We Are" and "Cry" with shopworn tunes like "Sinner Man," "St. James Infirmary Blues" and Bill Withers' "Ain't No Sunshine," Batiste made celestial connections between music's past — which he clearly, deeply understands — and his present. Between tunes, he almost seemed taken aback at what had transpired, like he was observing himself. "I was just playing," he quietly noted at one point. "I like that."
*Jon Batiste performing post-Q&A. Photo: John Lamparski/Getty Images*
The piano-and-a-microphone set — which contained material from his 2022 GRAMMYs-sweeping album We Are provided a window into how talented this guy truly is. But at a certain point, it all came back to that born starpower. Perhaps maintaining it means not being thrown off by an early morning, or the fact he couldn't see anyone's full faces. Maybe it means tapping into a shared energy, no matter what.
"I feel like everyone here, I'd probably like a lot," Batiste said before performing his final song of the night, "We Are." And from the sound of the enraptured crowd at Lincoln Center, the answer was clear: back atcha.
Check below for more details on the "A New York Evening With…" series, and keep checking RecordingAcademy.com for more recaps of these intimate, unforgettable East Coast evenings — courtesy of the GRAMMY Museum.