Live jazz will return to the Baltimore Museum of Art auditorium with the launch of the Baltimore Chamber Jazz Society's (BCJS) 30th anniversary season, Sunday, Apr. 10, at 5 p.m. Stefon Harris and his quintet, Blackout, will make their Baltimore debut together performing a mix of “sleek, slinky soul, funk, R&B and hip-hop - like Stevie Wonder rubbing elbows with George Gershwin.”

Heralded as "one of the most important artists in jazz," Harris won the prestigious Martin E. Segal Award from Lincoln Center, earned four GRAMMY™ nominations and has been named Best Mallet player eight times by the Jazz Journalists Association. He also was chosen “Best Vibes” in numerous DownBeat Magazine and Jazz Times critics polls.

A Lionel Hampton, Milt Jackson and Bobby Hutcherson disciple, Harris belongs to the grand lineage of vibraphonists in jazz. This sought-after bandleader, sideman (for Wynton Marsalis, Diana Krall, Ry Cooder, Common and others), teacher and TED Talk thought leader was called “the standout vibraphonist of his generation” by The New Yorker.

Harris’ newest album with Blackout, Sonic Creed, was named 2020 Jazz Album of the Year by WBGO – the world’s #1 jazz station. Chronicling the story of a people and their time on the planet, it’s a “reflection of African-American life in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. A sonic manifestation and creed of family, community and legacy, it explores afresh the music of masters such as Bobby Hutcherson, Abbey Lincoln, Wayne Shorter and Horace Silver.”