Thursday, September 28, 2006

Jazz legend Billy Taylor, the Grammy Award-winning pianist, composer and Kennedy Center educator, was honored last week with a Duke Ellington Jazz Festival Lifetime Achievement Award. Members of the Congressional Black Caucus were on hand for the ceremony.

Taylor, who grew up in the District, founded the Kennedy Center's jazz program and retired as artistic adviser.

He is world-renowned, having performed with such fellow jazz legends Dizzy Gillespie, Ella Fitzgerald and Miles Davis.

In 1958, he was music director of the first television show about jazz on NBC, "The Subject Is Jazz." He is a National Endowment for the Arts jazz master and a recipient of the National Medal of Arts, awarded by president George H.W. Bush. He also has received two Peabody Awards and an Emmy.

The Lifetime Achievement Award was timed to help kick off the second annual Duke Ellington Jazz Festival, scheduled for Wednesday through Sunday in the District. The festival will include performances throughout the city -- many of which are free -- by an array of artists, including Dr. John, Paquito D'Rivera, Roy Hargrove, Roy Haynes, Poncho Sanchez and Randy Weston.

Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), co-chairman of the Honorary Congressional Host Committee, said honoring Taylor will help elevate the stature of the festival.

For information about performances, visit http://www.dejazzfest.org .