Jimmy Heath would have turned 100 this Sunday, October 25. Two weeks later, on Saturday, November 7, the Queens Jazz Orchestra will mark the centennial on the stage of Flushing Town Hall with a concert built entirely from his orchestral writing, including pieces that have never been played for a public audience.

Saxophonist Antonio Hart leads the orchestra. The show starts at 8 p.m. in the 308-seat theater inside the 1862 landmark at 137-35 Northern Boulevard, at the corner of Linden Place.

Who Jimmy Heath was

Heath, a saxophonist and composer, was born in Philadelphia on October 25, 1926, and died on January 19, 2020. He was named an NEA Jazz Master, and over a long career he worked with a roster that ran from John Coltrane and Miles Davis to Tony Bennett. He came from a family of jazz players: in 1975 he formed The Heath Brothers with bassist Percy Heath and drummer Albert (Tootie) Heath, and the group toured until 2010.

He was also a Queens resident for decades. Heath and his wife, Mona, lived in Corona for many years before moving to Loganville, Georgia. Members of the Queens Jazz Orchestra called him Master Heath, according to Flushing Town Hall.

The orchestra and its leader

The Queens Jazz Orchestra was founded by the Flushing Council on Culture and the Arts, the nonprofit that runs Flushing Town Hall, as part of its long-running jazz programming. The council also produced the Queens Jazz Trail Map, which traces the borough's history as home to Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, John Coltrane and many others.

Hart was hand-picked by Heath to carry his music forward. Born in Baltimore in 1968, Hart came to jazz in his late teens after hearing Charlie Parker, Coltrane and Sonny Stitt on local radio. He studied at the Baltimore School for the Arts and Berklee College of Music, toured with his classmate, trumpeter Roy Hargrove, and later earned a master's degree at Queens College, where his teachers included Heath and trumpeter Donald Byrd.

Hart's own recordings include his 1991 debut, For the First Time, and Here I Stand, which earned a Grammy nomination. As a sideman he has recorded with Dizzy Gillespie, McCoy Tyner, Nat Adderley, Ray Brown, Monty Alexander, Dee Dee Bridgewater and opera singer Kathleen Battle, among others.

What is on the program

The evening is devoted to Heath's orchestral compositions. Flushing Town Hall says some of the pieces on the program have never been performed publicly.

Copies of Heath's autobiography, I Walked With Giants, will be for sale in the Flushing Town Hall gift shop on the night of the concert.

Tickets and tables

Advance general admission is $45, or $40 for Flushing Town Hall members. Tickets bought on the day of the show are $50, or $45 for members.

A limited number of tables for two are available by reservation for $150 ($130 for members). Each table includes two tickets, a bottle of wine and a plate of cheese and charcuterie. Tables are assigned first come, first served.

Members of Flushing Town Hall's Circle of Friends program can attend a free pre-show reception at 6:30 p.m. in the building's gallery, with food, wine, beer and soft drinks. Members RSVP through a form on the event page.

The box office offers discounted tickets to students (up to two per event, bought in person with a valid student ID), to veterans and active-duty service members, and to Cool Culture members. The box office is open Monday through Friday from noon to 5 p.m. and two hours before every event, and can be reached at (718) 463-7700, extension 222.

Getting there

Flushing Town Hall is about a five-minute walk from the Flushing-Main Street station on the 7 line: walk north on Main Street to Northern Boulevard, turn right, and the building is a block and a half down on the left. The Q13, Q28, Q44, Q65 and Q66 buses, among others, stop nearby. The building has an elevator and a lift at the front entrance; the theater balcony is not wheelchair accessible.

Evening parking in the building's two attended lots is reserved for members. Public lots are nearby at 35-15 Farrington Street and 38-19 Union Street.

If you want more jazz before then

Flushing Town Hall's monthly jazz jam, led by saxophonist Carol Sudhalter, returns on Wednesday, November 11, with a Veterans Day program built around musicians who served, including Coltrane, Tony Bennett, Glenn Miller, Josephine Baker, Harry Belafonte and B.B. King. Players of every level can sit in, and listeners are welcome.

Tickets for the Jimmy Heath Centennial Concert are on sale now through Flushing Town Hall's website and box office.

Sources