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Jon Batiste
From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist
Jon Batiste, born in 1986 in Metairie, Louisiana, grew up in Kenner and comes from the New Orleans musical Batiste family, which also includes Lionel Batiste of the Treme Brass Band and Milton Batiste of the Olympia Brass Band. At eight he played drums in the family band, the Batiste Brothers Band. At eleven, on his mother's advice, he switched to piano and had classical lessons for seven years. He also practised by transcribing songs from video games such as Street Fighter Alpha and Final Fantasy VII. His debut album Times in New Orleans was released when he was seventeen.
Music and breakthrough
He studied jazz at the Juilliard School, where he earned his bachelor's degree in 2008 and his master's in 2011. Albums followed such as MY N.Y., Social Music and Hollywood Africans from 2018. From 2015 to 2022 he was, with his band Stay Human, bandleader and musical director of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. He collaborated with Alicia Keys, Stevie Wonder, Prince, Willie Nelson and Lauryn Hill, among others. In 2020 he wrote, with Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, the score for the Pixar film Soul, for which they received an Oscar, a Golden Globe, a Grammy and a BAFTA.
Influence
In 2021 he won a Grammy for Album of the Year with We Are. In total he won eight, from twenty-five nominations. The 2023 documentary American Symphony follows him as he composes his first symphony. He is also musical director of The Atlantic and creative director of the National Jazz Museum in Harlem. In this way he links the jazz tradition of New Orleans with today's pop culture and television.
Listening
Discography
Studio albums
- 2005Times In New Orleans
- 2011MY N.Y.
- 2013Jazz Is Now
- 2014The Process
- 2016Christmas With Jon Batiste
- 2018Hollywood Africans
- 2020Meditations
- 2020Music From and Inspired by Soul (soundtrack)
- 2021We Are
- 2023World Music Radio
- 2024Beethoven Blues
- 2024Saturday Night: Original Score (soundtrack)
- 2025BIG MONEY
- 2026Black Mozart
- 2026Monk Meditations
- 2026Monk Movements
In School of Rock
The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.
- The Dream Factory: Film Reel 5NL Reader
Mentioned in other articles
- Industrial and electronic texture scores Genre
After The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011) and Gone Girl (2014), they made the music for the Pixar film Soul (2020) with the jazz musician Jon Batiste.