Women in Jazz | Toshiko Akiyoshi behind the poster
Description:
Featured on the official 2020 poster is pianist, band leader, and composer-arranger Toshiko Akiyoshi, whose vital contributions to the art of big band jazz earned her the title of NEA Jazz Master in 2007. Born in Manchuria, Akiyoshi first moved to Japan with her parents at the end of World War II, and then to the United States in 1956 to study at Berklee School of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. Following a series of performances in top New York venues, in 1973, she and her husband, saxophonist/flutist Lew Tabackin, formed the Toshiko Akiyoshi - Lew Tabackin Big Band. Celebrate jazz with a new poster and the 2020 limited release free poster giveaway! For more information on how to request your own poster visit: https://americanhistory.si.edu/smithsonian-jazz/jazz-appreciation-month/jazz-appreciation-month-posters#Free-Posters Since 1991, Smithsonian Jazz has collected oral histories from the greatest names in jazz. Explore some of our oral histories with the iconic women, including Toshiko Akiyoshi’s full oral history here: https://americanhistory.si.edu/smithsonian-jazz/collections-and-archives/smithsonian-jazz-oral-history-program#Akiyoshi For more information on the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra visit: https://americanhistory.si.edu/smithsonian-jazz/smithsonian-jazz-masterworks-orchestra
