Award winner
Darrell Grant has risen from his introduction to audiences as the pianist in vocalist Betty Carter’s trio to an internationally-recognized performer, composer, and educator who channels the power of music to create community, sustainability, and social justice.
Having performed with jazz luminaries including Frank Morgan, Tony Williams, Brian Blade, Esperanza Spalding, and Nicholas Payton, he followed his 1994 New York Times Top 10 Jazz Album Black Art with seven albums receiving critical acclaim from publications including The Village Voice and DownBeat Magazine. He has toured as a bandleader and solo artist throughout the U.S., Canada, and Europe as well as in Turkey and Japan in venues from Paris’s La Villa jazz club to the Havana Jazz Festival.
Dedicated to themes of hope, community, and place, Grant’s compositions include his 2012 Step by Step: The Ruby Bridges Suite honoring the civil rights icon who integrated New Orleans’s public schools. Also in 2012, he won a Chamber Music America grant for his composition The Territory which explores the terroir of music through the geographic and cultural history of Oregon. Committed to practicing civic engagement through artistry, Grant has driven pianos deep into state forests to support the environment, arranged protest anthems, and shared the stage with Bishop Desmond Tutu.
Grant lives in Portland, Oregon where he was inducted into the Jazz Society of Oregon Hall of Fame in 2009. In 2017, he received a Northwest Regional Emmy for his composition in the Oregon Public Broadcasting special “Jazz Town,” and he was also named Portland Jazz Hero by the Jazz Journalists Association. Most recently, he was named the 2019 Portland Jazz Master by PDX Jazz. He currently serves as Vice President of the board of Chamber Music America and is a Professor of Music at Portland State University where directs the Leroy Vinnegar Jazz Institute.
Having performed with jazz luminaries including Frank Morgan, Tony Williams, Brian Blade, Esperanza Spalding, and Nicholas Payton, he followed his 1994 New York Times Top 10 Jazz Album Black Art with seven albums receiving critical acclaim from publications including The Village Voice and DownBeat Magazine. He has toured as a bandleader and solo artist throughout the U.S., Canada, and Europe as well as in Turkey and Japan in venues from Paris’s La Villa jazz club to the Havana Jazz Festival.
Dedicated to themes of hope, community, and place, Grant’s compositions include his 2012 Step by Step: The Ruby Bridges Suite honoring the civil rights icon who integrated New Orleans’s public schools. Also in 2012, he won a Chamber Music America grant for his composition The Territory which explores the terroir of music through the geographic and cultural history of Oregon. Committed to practicing civic engagement through artistry, Grant has driven pianos deep into state forests to support the environment, arranged protest anthems, and shared the stage with Bishop Desmond Tutu.
Grant lives in Portland, Oregon where he was inducted into the Jazz Society of Oregon Hall of Fame in 2009. In 2017, he received a Northwest Regional Emmy for his composition in the Oregon Public Broadcasting special “Jazz Town,” and he was also named Portland Jazz Hero by the Jazz Journalists Association. Most recently, he was named the 2019 Portland Jazz Master by PDX Jazz. He currently serves as Vice President of the board of Chamber Music America and is a Professor of Music at Portland State University where directs the Leroy Vinnegar Jazz Institute.
