This month, in honor of his 33rd birthday (born November 11, 1986,) we have selected American musician, bandleader, and television personality Jon Batiste.
Jonathan Batiste is a Grammy-nominated musician, TV personality, and bandleader of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Though just 33 years old, he has released 11 albums and Eps (including his just-released “Anatomy of Angels: Live at the Village Vanguard”) and has recorded and performed with such artists as Stevie Wonder, Prince, Willie Nelson, Ed Sheeran and Mavis Staples. He is the Music Director of The Atlantic and Artistic Co-Director and Creative Director of the National Jazz Museum in Harlem.
Born into a family of professional musicians, at eight, young Batiste played percussion and drums with his family, the Batiste Brothers Band. At 11, he switched to piano. Six years later, attending the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts (with Trombone Shorty) he released his first album on Apple Music, Times in New Orleans. In 2004 he graduated from St. Augustine High School in New Orleans followed by a bachelor’s and master’s degree from NYC’s Juilliard School.
Among his countless honors, Batiste has been awarded the American Jazz Museum Lifetime Achievement Award, the Harry Chapin ASCAP Humanitarian Award, and the Movado Future Legend Award. This year, his cover of “St. James Infirmary Blues” was nominated for a Grammy. And he recently completed a U.S. festival tour with The Dap-Kings, a soul and funk band.
