Blues and the Pursuit of Freedom deploys the power of the blues to speak to the present moment. A cultural force that embodies the tension and release of the pursuit of freedom, the blues provide a communal language that transcends the boundaries of instruments, solos and rhythms.
The blues courses through extended musical suites composed by Shelby, inspired by freedom movements and important moments in the history of Black Americans and all people under threat of elimination by the current administration.
BLUES and the PURSUIT of FREEDOM
@ Yerba Buena Gardens Festival 2025
Sat., August 16, 2025
2:00pm – 3:30pm
Great Lawn,
Yerba Buena Gardens
San Francisco, CA
Featuring selections from:
GREEN AND BLUES
BLACK BALL: THE NEGRO LEAGUES AND THE BLUES
BLUES IN THE CITY
Marcus Shelby Orchestra
Tony Peebles (alto)
Laurel Fink (alto/flute)
Patrick Wolff (tenor/clarinet)
Danny Brown (tenor)
Melecio Magdaluyo (baritone)
Danny Lubin-Laden (trombone)
Victor Imbo (trombone)
Riley Baker (trombone/tuba)
Erik Andrews (trumpet)
Mike Olmos (trumpet)
Christopher Lowell Clarke (trumpet) Richard Benitez (trumpet)
Greg Jacobs (piano)
Jemal Ramirez (drums)
Marcus Shelby (bass)
Special Guest Artists:
John Calloway (flute)
Michela Marino Lerman (tap dance)
Stella Heath (vocals)
Enid Picket (poet)
Dillon Vado (vibraphonist)
Program
GREEN AND BLUES
Marcus Shelby, composer
Marcus Shelby Orchestra, featuring John Calloway (flute)
Wandering Blues 1
Le Gente de Razón
Wandering Blues 2
Blues Up and Down
BLACK BALL:
The Negro Leagues and The Blues
Marcus Shelby, composer
Marcus Shelby Orchestra, featuring Stella Heath (vocals),
Michela Marino Lerman (tap dance) & Enid Pickett (poetry)
Prelude
Pittsburgh Crawfords
New York Cubans
Barnstormin’
Black Ball Swing
Fleetwood and Weldey
Effa’s Blues
Did You See Jackie Robinson?
BLUES IN THE CITY
Marcus Shelby, composer
Marcus Shelby Orchestra, featuring Dillon Vado (vibraphone)
& Enid Pickett (poetry)
“… I can only speak as what I am. I’m a kind of poet and if I’m a kind of poet then I’m responsible, from my own point of view, to the people who produced me and the people who will come after me. So that when the holocaust comes, and it will come eventually-no matter how simple black and white terms may be today, life is not that simple-and sooner or later, if I do my work as I should do it, when I’m needed I’ll be there.”
JAMES BALDWIN
— from A Dialogue, pg 26-27, by Jame Baldwin and Nikki Giovanni, 1973.
Developed from the transcript of a conversation, taped for the television program “Soul,” and first shown in the United States on WNET-TV, Dec. 1971
Purpose: “Blues in the City: I am kind of a Poet”
Unhoused: “Tenderloin”
Artist Biographies
Dr. John Calloway is a nationally recognized multi-instrumentalist, composer and arranger who has simultaneously had a dual career in education for over 35 years. Known for his prolific work in Jazz, Latin American and other Global music styles, John has performed with such internationally known jazz musicians as Dizzy Gillespie, Charles Musselwhite, Arturo Sandoval, Israel “Cachao” Lopez, Max Roach, Pete Escovedo, and in the SF Bay Area, with Kulintang Arts, Jesus Diaz, Mark Levine, John Santos, Marcus Shelby and Wayne Wallace.
Michela Marino Lerman is a celebrated tap dance artist, musician, improviser, choreographer, and educator, celebrated for her dynamic performances and innovative approach to the art of tap dance. Her work primarily explores the intersection of tap and music, particularly jazz, positioning tap not only as dance but also as a significant form of music. Recognized by Downbeat Magazine as “jazz’s premier tap dancer” and described by The New York Times as “an outstanding jazz musician,” she has garnered widespread acclaim for her contributions to both fields.
Stella Heath grew up in the North San Francisco Bay Area, steeped in her mother’s eclectic music collection; some of her early musical influences were Louis Armstrong, Edith Piaf, Buena Vista Social Club, Billie Holiday, Tom Waits, Bod Dylan and Ella Fitzgerald. Stella has blended history and music in programs such as “The Billie Holiday Project.” “Stella Meets Nat,” “From Billie Holiday to Edith Piaf,” “Unsung Standards” and “Stella Swings Ella.” In her role as Education Coordinator for Healdsburg Jazz, Stella works to bring Jazz and cultural music into the Public School System and Community in Sonoma County.
Enid Pickett is a poet, writer, and teacher. With over 30 years of teaching experience, she has served as a master teacher at Sonoma State University, as well as on the Advisory Board of Learning for Justice. She also trained with NEA Human and Civil Rights Department as a Diversity Trainer for 15 years, and she was a Commissioner on the Status of Women in Sonoma County. In 2020, she became the Poet Laureate for Healdsburg Jazz. Her collection of poetry, Through the Eyes of Enid, was published in 2024.
Dillon Vado is a professional drummer and vibraphonist in the San Francisco Bay Area, and a graduate of the California Jazz Conservatory in Berkeley. He grew up in San Jose, where he played many small club gigs on drums and marched snare drum for the Santa Clara Vanguard. He has performed overseas at the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland and the Umbria Jazz Festival in Italy. Some notable artists Dillon has had the pleasure of performing with include Art Lande, Hafez Modirzadeh, Royal Hartigan, Marcus Shelby, Erik Jekabson, Jeff Denson, Alan Hall, Jovino Santos Neto, Marcos Silva and Kate McGarry.
Photo by Bethanie Hines
Marcus Shelby is a composer, bassist, bandleader, and educator who currently lives in San Francisco, California. His work focuses on the history, present, and future of African American lives social movements and music education.
As YBGF Resident Composer, Shelby has created a celebrated body of work for his orchestra, inspired by a multi-faceted array of Black life, from legendary abolitionists and civil rights leaders to Negro League baseball.
BLUES and the PURSUIT of FREEDOM @ YBGF
Blues and the Pursuit of Freedom is an all-encompassing piece about the role and history of the blues and its relationship to freedom movements in American history. The Abolitionist movement, the Women’s Rights movement, the Worker’s Rights movement, the Civil Rights movement, the Chicano Rights movement, and the LGBT movement all used music effectively to inspire, inform, and unify.
Green and Blues
2012 Premiere Performance
@ Yerba Buena Gardens Festival
September 15, 2012, 1:00pm – 2:30pm
Green and Blues celebrates and honors the virtues of a sustainable and green environment with instrumentals, vocals, and spoken word. Initially begun in 2011 as an educational workshop designed to teach San Francisco public school students the value of sustainability through music, Green and Blues evolved to become a musical expression of the rich history of San Francisco, starting with the native Ohlone Tribes all the way to modern day Hunters Point and the toxic legacy of environmental harm that is still being dealt with today.
Marcus Shelby, Tiffany Austin, L. Peter Callender, Jazmine Pierce and Donald Lacy.
Black Ball: The Negro Leagues and the Blues 2018 Premiere Performance
@ Yerba Buena Gardens Festival
Sat, Sep 8, 2018, 1:00pm – 2:30pm
Shelby’s YBGF two-year residency project (2017-2018) culminated in Black Ball: The Negro Leagues and the Blues, a musical suite inspired by the history of the Negro Leagues that made a significant contribution to American life during reconstruction and segregation.
“Black Ball” is inspired by the character, love, courage, brilliance, failure, and humor of Negro League players who made far-reaching but oft-overlooked contributions to American life during the years from Reconstruction through the 1950s.
Blues in the City
2022 Premiere Performance
@ Yerba Buena Gardens Festival
Sat, Sep 3, 2022, 1:00pm – 2:30pm
From 2020 to 2022, YBGF Resident Artist Marcus Shelby spent two years researching and developing a new musical suite inspired by how the city of San Francisco has experienced and responded in the year 2020 to the homeless crisis, COVID-19, and civil unrest, which has had a drastic effect on the homeless, the poor, and BIPOC communities.
Yerba Buena Gardens Festival was founded in 2000 to honor the diverse cultural heritage of San Francisco. In the 1970s and 1980s, redevelopment in the South of Market district displaced thousands of poor people – mostly Filipino immigrants, low-income families and single men living in SRO hotels. Activists pressured the City to guarantee that the Yerba Buena Gardens Project would include a public space for arts and community.
YBG Festival was founded to program all activities in Yerba Buena Gardens, committed to fulfilling the vision of those activists and their promise to the displaced, the low-income and the communities of color in San Francisco.