Brightening up the summer doldrums is the appearance of so many Frost School of Music faculty, alumni, and former faculty in Downbeat Magazine’s 72nd Annual Critics Poll. The jazz bible’s August issue lists hundreds of outstanding artists in more than 60 categories, selected by over 100 critics from across the United States, in the definitive yearly who’s who of the jazz world.
Professor, trumpet player and Afro-Caribbean jazz visionary Etienne Charles was named four times, in Rising Star Trumpet, Rising Star Jazz Group, Rising Star Composer and Rising Star Jazz Artist. Fellow professor Dafnis Prieto, a MacArthur Genuis Award winning drummer and composer, appeared in the Percussion and Rising Star Drums categories, while professor, trumpet player and composer Brian Lynch, who’s played with legends like Eddie Palmieri and Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, appeared in the Trumpet category.
Henry Mancini Institute artistic director Maria Schneider, a longtime critical favorite, topped both the Composer and Big Band categories. Her predecessor, Terence Blanchard, was second in both the Composer and Trumpet divisions, and was also honored in the Artist of the Year group.
Christian McBride, the artistic director of the JAS Academy, the Frost School’s stellar summer jazz program in partnership with Jazz Aspen Snowmass, appears an impressive seven times, including in the Bass, Big Band, Artist of the Year and Album of the Year categories.
Alumni who make the issue include two buzzed-about young artists: pianist Emmet Cohen, whose trio topped the Rising Star Jazz Group, and also appeared in Rising Star Jazz Artist and Piano; and vocalist Veronica Swift, who is in the Female Vocalist and Rising Star Jazz Artist categories. Alumnus, music executive and producer Matt Pierson appeared in the Producer division, and Bobby Watson, a legendary graduate from the 1970’s, appeared in the Alto Saxophone division. Genre-redefining guitarist and twenty-time GRAMMY winner Pat Metheny, who not only attended the Frost School but was the youngest person, at 18, to ever teach here, was honored in the Composer and Guitar categories.
Finally, Luciana Souza, the Brazilian-born, GRAMMY-winning vocalist and songwriter who inspired so many Frost School students as an artist-in-residence during the 2022-23 school year, was named in the Female Vocalist category.
