There have been numerous concerts of all sorts of music in support of the New Orleans hurricane victims. At Michigan State University, Rodney Whitaker, who is head of the jazz studies program, is organizing a concert today that includes some New Orleans musicians, for which MSU provided stipends. More details in this article in the Lansing State Journal by Mike Hughes (click here).

The show includes:

• Herlin Riley. “He’s probably the master of the New Orleans drum style,” Whitaker said.

• Two more visiting New Orleans men, pianist Peter Martin and multi-instrumentalist Don Vappie, who plays the banjo for the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and his own Creole Jazz Serenaders.

• The Professors of Jazz, a combo that includes Whitaker, Wilkinson, Rivera, Randy Gelispie, Rick Roe and, this year, Anderson.

• The Beaumont Brass Quintet.

• More MSU classical musicians – pianist Panayis Lyras, cellist Suren Bagratuni, violinist Dmitri Berlinsky and tenor Richard Fracker.

• Baritone Haijing Fu. He and Fracker sing with the Metropolitan Opera.