In Light of Wynton Marsalis' Retirement from the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra in 2027...

It was the summer of 1979—probably August—when I first saw Wynton Marsalis play jazz. He and I were both fellows that summer at the Tanglewood Music Center, where we had been performing classical repertoire all season with conductors such as Seiji Ozawa and Gunther Schuller.
 
One evening after dinner, I was walking through a hallway and noticed Gunther Schuller sitting alone in a dimly lit room. He was listening to his son, George Schuller, and Wynton Marsalis—along with others whose names I no longer remember—playing a jazz set for him. I paused briefly, then moved on. It was a moment that didn’t fully register until years later. Gunther was listening to someone he recognized as extraordinary, a 19-year-old musician already speaking fluently in a language he deeply understood.
 
I’ve often regretted not staying longer that night—of not hearing what Gunther was hearing. Perhaps the many times I’ve listened to Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra over the past 20 years, through the Celebrity Series in Boston or live at Columbus Circle in New York, help make up for that missed moment. It remains, every time, a pleasure and a joy to hear him live, whether with a large ensemble or a small one.  Even now, every time I hear him play, I’m reminded of what I almost heard that night.  And maybe more importantly, I learned that the hardest thing to recognize is genius while it’s still unfolding.