Overview by The Rev. Dr. Mark S. Harvey

From its inception in the 1960s, the story of jazz at Emmanuel has been about bringing jazz and jazz artists into the church for liturgies and concerts as well as enabling this powerful music to engage with the wider community in a variety of ways. Through all of this, Emmanuel Church became a major center of jazz activity in Boston and a key resource for all sorts and conditions of people who experienced jazz as a significant modern spiritual language.

I coordinated the work of the jazz programs from an office provided by Emmanuel Church through 1992. The Jazz/Arts Ministry provided counseling and pastoral offices (weddings, memorials) to jazz musicians and other artists, engaged in liturgical explorations with churches, colleges, and theological schools throughout the Northeast, and presented the weekly Jazz Celebrations performance series. My ministry was also focused on outreach and community building through the efforts of The Jazz Coalition, Inc.. The Jazz Coalition was an advocacy and support group for jazz and jazz artists, which presented an annual All Nite Jazz Concert, an annual Boston Jazz Week festival, and many other special programs including the Community Concert Series.   Through its JazzEd program, coordinated by Arni Cheatham, it brought jazz musicians to local schools, hospitals, and prisons.

The Aardvark Jazz Orchestra, which I directed, presented my compositions with spiritual and social-consciousness themes as well as music from the jazz tradition with an emphasis on the sacred music of Duke Ellington. Having presented an annual Christmas benefit concert during the season of Advent at Emmanuel through 1992, the Aardvark Orchestra reconnected with Emmanuel in 2003 and continued presenting  Christmas Concerts at the church through 2019.

Selected Highlights

Compiled by Mark Harvey, based on his research and that of Mary G. Chitty, our Parish Historian

1966

• January 14.  The Rev. Alvin L. Kershaw emceed the inaugural Boston Globe Jazz Festival at Boston’s War Memorial Auditorium (now the Hynes Civic Center)
• April 24.  Ed Summerlin’s “Liturgy of the Holy Spirit” was performed by the Herb Pomeroy Sextet.  Kershaw presided with about 500 people in the congregation.   Pomeroy’s band included leading jazz musicians from Boston and New York: Charlie Mariano, John LaPorta, Gene DiStasio, Ron Carter, and Paul Chambers.  Herb was a superb jazz artist, a faculty member of Berklee College of Music and MIT, and a good friend of Kershaw.

1969. April 20.   Duke Ellington’s “Second Sacred Concert” was performed by the Duke Ellington Orchestra, presented by the Episcopal Chaplaincy at Harvard and Radcliffe with Kershaw presiding.

1973.  December 23. The Aardvark Jazz Orchestra performed a benefit concert, which became a Christmas tradition.

1974

• Spring.  Mark Harvey began his association with Al Kershaw, rector of Emmanuel Church.  Prior to this, Harvey had served as intern-minister, then associate minister, of Boston’s Old West Church (1969 – 1973).  A United Methodist, Harvey was seeking a home base for his ecumenical jazz/arts ministry and its Jazz Celebrations program, the Jazz Coalition, Inc., and his Aardvark Jazz Orchestra.  He was also seeking support for his pursuit of Elder’s Orders, the second and final stage of ministerial certification and ordination within the United Methodist Church.  To this end, an ecumenical support committee for the Jazz/Arts Ministry was organized with Kershaw acting as chairperson.  
• May 4.  All-Nite Jazz Concert, featuring jazz piano luminary and New England Conservatory faculty member Jaki Byard along with two dozen other Boston musicians, was presented at Emmanuel by the Jazz Coalition as part of Boston Jazz Week.  A recording of this eight-hour event is held in the Worcester Polytechnic Institute Jazz Archives.  After this event, the All-Nite Concerts were held down the street at the Church of the Covenant. 
• September 1.  The Jazz/Arts Ministry, the Jazz Coalition, and the Aardvark Jazz Orchestra began residencies as part of Emmanuel’s multifaceted arts program through 1992.  In addition to Harvey, this arts program involved resident artists such as the storyteller Brother Blue, the Northeast Kingdom Puppet Theater, and vocalist Donna Hewitt-Didham.  All participated in the liturgical life of Emmanuel on special occasions at the invitation of Kershaw.
• Fall.  Harvey and storyteller Brother Blue participated in the 50th Anniversary Celebration of the consecration of the Leslie Lindsey Memorial Chapel. Throughout the 1970s, illustrious trombonist and Berklee College of Music faculty member Phil Wilson, who was a good friend of Kershaw, participated in Easter Sunday liturgies and occasionally presented concerts at Emmanuel with his student ensemble, the Thursday Night Dues Band.

1975. 

• Spring. The JazzEd program of the Jazz Coalition, directed by Arni Cheatham, brought
  educational programs into public schools and into urban/suburban school pairings, as part of the effort to desegregate Boston public schools. Cheatham and Harvey team-taught in many of these offerings. This program was coordinated from his office at Emmanuel.
• Nov. 2. The Jazz Celebrations Series, a program of the Jazz/Arts Ministry, was re-instituted after a two-year hiatus. Several-hundred Boston jazz musicians as well as nationally known artists were presented in weekly performances held in Emmanuel’s Sanctuary and Parish Hall through the spring of 1983. WBUR Radio recorded many of these concerts for later broadcast on its “Jazz at the Church” program.

1976

• Jan. 18.  Mary Lou Williams presented her “Mary Lou’s Mass” aka “Music for Peace” with the Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts Choir, storyteller Brother Blue, Kershaw, Harvey, and the Rev. Peter O’Brien, SJ, who was Ms. Williams’ manager.  It was presented as part of the Jazz Celebrations Series.
• March 7. A benefit concert for artists affected by the massive Jamaica Plain Plant Shoe Factory Fire, which had occurred on February 1. Some 80 artists had been displaced since the Factory had been converted earlier to artist housing. The concert was presented by Jazz Celebrations and the Jazz Coalition. Among two-dozen performers was the renowned South-African-expatriate composer/pianist Abdullah Ibrahim (Dollar Brand), who made his Boston debut in a solo performance.
• April 16. Harvey’s “Preface to Uneasiness: The Stations of the Cross,” a music-drama with text by the Rev. Frank Halse, Syracuse University chaplain, was presented with members of Aardvark and the Northeast Puppet Kingdom as a Good Friday event. This work would be presented on Good Friday at Emmanuel for the next several years.

1977. April 22.  Harvey presided at a funeral service given for Margaret Stedman Chaloff, a renowned piano teacher in Boston and the mother of noted jazz baritone-saxophonist Serge Chaloff.

1978

• March 16. The Boston Globe Jazz Festival presented an evening at Emmanuel, featuring Phil Wilson, his Trombone Choir, and tenor-saxophone master Sam Rivers among others.  Enjoyed by an audience of 800, it was reported in The Globe (March 17) by Ernie Santosuosso: “Jazz Festival Goes to Church,” and by Ray Murphy: “Jazzfest Taps New Audience” (March 23).
• October.  The Friends of Great Black Music Loft presented its John Coltrane Memorial Concert at Emmanuel and for several years following before it moved to Northeastern University.

1979. January. WBUR Radio began a Sunday-evening program broadcasting recordings of
performances from the Jazz Celebrations Series at Emmanuel. Among the inaugural sessions of “Jazz at the Church,” were the John Coltrane Memorial Concert, saxophonist Arni Cheatham’s “Search,” and pianist James Williams’ group.

1982. 

• December 12. World-renowned saxophonist Anthony Braxton with pianist Marilyn Crispell and bassist Dave Holland presented a concert co-sponsored by Jazz Celebrations, the Jazz Coalition, the Modern Theater, and WGBH.
• December 19. The Tenth Annual Aardvark Christmas Concert, featuring the revised version of Harvey’s “Mass” (1973), was presented at Emmanuel as a benefit for the Poor People’s United Fund. .

1983.  June 18. Harvey produced a world premiere of George Russell’s “The African Game,” a forty-minute composition for 25 musicians, which was commissioned by the Jazz Coalition, the Massachusetts Council on the Arts and Humanities, and the Swedish Radio Company.  A recording of this live performance was released as two Grammy-nominated LPs (later CDs) on the prestigious Blue Note label. George Russell was an eminent composer, theorist, and faculty member of the New England Conservatory.

1988.

• Feb. 5.  A rehearsal was held in the Parish Hall with gospel/soul artist the Rev. Al Green and Ann Swain Clark, choral director for Duke Ellington’s Sacred Concert.
• Feb. 6, Duke Ellington’s Sacred Concert was presented in Symphony Hall, Boston, by the Duke Ellington Orchestra with Mercer Ellington conducting.  Harvey, who was religious and musical consultant to the concert, wrote program notes for the production.

1989. March 19.  A special Jazz Celebration concert was presented in honor of Kershaw’s
retirement from Emmanuel. Featured musicians included the Aardvark Jazz Orchestra and a
quintet led by Phil Wilson and Herb Pomeroy, longtime friends of Kershaw in the Boston jazz community. A rousing rendition of “Down by the Riverside” concluded the festivities in the
classic New Orleans jazz style that Kershaw so loved.

2004. December 19.  Harvey’s extended composition “No Walls,” which was inspired by Duke Ellington’s credo to move “beyond category” in music and life, was premiered in  Aardvark Jazz Orchestra’s 32rd Annual Christmas Concert as a benefit for Doctors Without Borders. It was recorded in live performance and released by Aardmuse Recordings on a CD entitled, “No Walls: A Christmas Concert.”

2006. April 2. The Aardvark Jazz Orchestra presented “40 Years of Jazz at Emmanuel and 40 Years of Duke Ellington’s Sacred Concerts” as the last of a three-concert series commemorating these historic milestones.  Harvey lectured in conjunction with the concerts.

2007. Sept. 9.  A memorial service was performed by three-dozen musicians for Herb Pomeroy.  It was coordinated by Dr. Fred Harris of MIT, Greg Hopkins of Berklee College of Music, and Harvey.  MIT’s Chaplain the Rev. Robert Randolph, the Rev. Dr. Maureen Dallison Kemeza of Emmanuel, and Harvey participated in the service.

2010. Dec. 15. The 38th Annual Aardvark Christmas Concert featured a collaboration with the Boston Public Quartet, a string quartet comprised of musicians from Emmanuel Music who taught in the Chittick Elementary School in Mattapan. Students from the school also performed, and the evening’s proceeds were contributed to this ongoing educational work.

2014. April 30. A Jazz Week evening concert entitled “No Walls”, featuring several top Boston jazz groups, was presented by JazzBoston on International Jazz Day. “No Walls” was the theme of Jazz Week inspired by Harvey’s composition of the same title, which had premiered at Emmanuel in 2004. At noontime, a small ensemble performed “No Walls” for the Boston City Council at Boston City Hall, with prefatory remarks by Harvey, who was a board member of JazzBoston.

2015. December 12. The 43rd Annual Aardvark Christmas Concert held at Emmanuel  celebrated the 50th Anniversary of Duke Ellington’s inaugural Concert of Sacred Music at San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral on September 16, 1965.  The concert benefitted Community Works, which had been associated with Emmanuel for decades.

2018. December 8. The 46th Annual Aardvark Christmas Concert, a benefit for the Poor People’s United Fund, paid tribute to its founder, the late Kip Tiernan, with the premiere of a suite entitled “Healers of the Universe”, which was composed by Harvey in her honor.

2019. December 14. The 47th Annual Aardvark Christmas Concert presented an eclectic program of music in the Spirit of the Season for the benefit of the Refugee Immigration Ministry. Due to the onset of Covid 19 in 2020, this became the last Aardvark performance at Emmanuel.