Captain Black Big Band

Captain Black Big Band with pianist Orrin Evans

The Captain Black Big Band started in 2009 as another project that jazz pianist Orrin Evans dreamed up.

The Captain Black Big Band, (named after Orrin’s late father, Donald T. Evans’ favorite tobacco) consists of (4) trombonists (5) saxophonists (4) trumpeter, a bassist, a drummer and (2) pianists not including the leader, who will occasionally jump in and perform a song or two. One of the interesting things about this project is that he has enlisted Frank Lacy, Todd Bashore and Darryl Yokley to do arrangements of many of his compositions and also arrangements of standards. One of the other unique qualities about this band is that many of the band members hail from Philadelphia, New York and New Jersey. In this rather eclectic pairing of musicians, you will find, professors, students, touring artist and professional recording artist.

Their latest release “Presence” was nominated for a 2019 Grammy Award