| Jazz |
Gary Bartz at 83: Still Playing, Still Listening, Still Leading
At first glance, Gary Bartz’s new album Damage Control might look like a slick, commercial project. The song choices are familiar, drawn from the catalogs of Curtis Mayfield, Anita Baker, Patti LaBelle, Debarge, and the personnel list reads like a who’s who of modern jazz. But such assumptions collapse within minutes of listening. This is not an album engineered for nostalgia or sales. It is, instead, a statement: the sound of an 83-year-old artist who refuses to coast, whose ear remains tuned to the present moment, and whose music insists on conversation rather than comfort.
Bartz has been here before. In 2021, the forward-looking label Jazz Is Dead devoted its sixth release to him, a record that paired his saxophone with the lush, analog textures of Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad. At the time, the collaboration underscored Bartz’s capacity to move fluidly between eras, to carry the spirit of bebop and spiritual jazz into a contemporary idiom that resonated with younger audiences. That record earned glowing reviews in both Paris and Los Angeles. Now, with Damage Control, Bartz has pivoted again, this time toward reinterpretations of songs he plays at home when the world quiets down. “These are the pieces that help me relax,” he says. “They make me feel good.”
Relaxation, though, is a relative term. These tracks do not settle into background music. Under Bartz’s direction, they transform into meditative soundscapes, shot through with harmonic curiosity and improvisational daring. The soul standards are recognizable, but Bartz unravels them, reshapes them, then rethreads them into something new. His saxophone voice, raspy, insistent, lyrical, refuses to treat the music as sacred text. Instead, he treats it as raw material.
That willingness to experiment is what has defined his six-decade career. Born in Baltimore in 1940, Bartz came of age at a time when jazz was both a musical form and a political act. His trajectory reads like a map of postwar Black music: Charles Mingus’s Jazz Workshop, Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, sessions with McCoy Tyner, Max Roach, Abbey Lincoln, and, most famously, Miles Davis. In the 1970s, his band Ntu Troop became a vehicle for politically charged spiritual jazz; his collaborations with the Mizell Brothers pushed him into jazz-funk; and, decades later, hip-hop producers mined his catalog for samples. A Tribe Called Quest, Warren G, and 9th Wonder all borrowed from him, introducing his work to audiences who might not have known his name but recognized his sound.
That influence has not gone unnoticed. Bartz has recorded more than 45 albums as a leader, contributed to more than 200 as a sideman, and last year was named an NEA Jazz Master, one of the highest honors in American music. It is not hyperbole to call him a national treasure.
Still, Bartz resists the museum-piece treatment. He continues to insist that music is not about labels. “Just because something is played in a club and called R&B doesn’t mean anything to me,” he says. “Music transcends labels. Music can’t be explained. It’s just sound.”
Yet for Bartz, sound has always carried weight beyond the sonic. His art has been inseparable from politics, even if not every note is overtly polemical. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, he considered joining the Black Panthers before deciding that his horn could be his weapon. Damage Control takes its title from maritime and medical terminology, efforts to keep a ship afloat, or to stabilize a wounded body. The metaphor is deliberate. “I’ve never felt safe in this country. Not for a single day,” Bartz says. The album, then, becomes a kind of shelter, both for its creator and for those who listen.
Paradoxically, the shelter is full of joy. On several tracks Bartz sings, his voice fragile yet warm, suffused with a humanity that makes the album unforgettable. In years to come, listeners will likely recall Damage Control not only for its arrangements, but for that rare sound of Bartz’s singing: “Remember that Gary Bartz album where he sang?”
The record also stands as a reminder of continuity. Bartz is one of the last living musicians to have worked directly with Mingus, Roach, Tyner, Blakey, and Davis. He embodies a lineage that stretches from bebop to hip-hop, from protest jazz to contemporary improvisation. His sound carries that history, not as burden but as connective tissue.
Damage Control is, in the end, less about damage than about resilience. It is the work of an artist who has endured, adapted, and thrived, who continues to translate his private listening into public art. It is also, unmistakably, a gift: a reminder that at 83, Gary Bartz is still listening, still learning, still leading.
Thierry De Clemensat
Member at Jazz Journalists Association
USA correspondent for Paris-Move and ABS magazine
Editor in chief – Bayou Blue Radio, Bayou Blue News
PARIS-MOVE, September 3rd 2025
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Musicians :
Gary Barts, Vocals, Saxophone Alto
Barney Mcall, piano & keyboards
Tarron Crayton, Bass
Om’Mas Keith, Drums & Percussions
Sam Anning, Acoustic Bas, Electric guitar
Brandee Younger, Harp
Ellias Mcall, Nylon String Guitar
Theo Crocker, Trumpet
Miles Kahlil, Tenor Saxophone
Rita Stach, Background & Lead Vocals
Juwett Bostick, Guitar
Spaceman Patterson, Guitar
Kamasi Washington, Tenor Saxophone
Terrace Martin, Alto Saxophone
Nile Rogers, Guitar
Dominique Sanders, Bass
Cory Henry, Organ
Daniel Merriwather, Lead & Backgrounds Vocals
Shelly Fka Dram, Vocals
Track Listing :
Fantasy
One Hundred Ways
In Search of My Heart/ Love Surrounds Us Everywhere
The Making of You
You Bring Me Joy
You are my Starship
Slow Jam
If Only You Knew
Biggest Part of Me
Love Me in a Special Way
Tour Dates :
Sun 11/9/2025 Utrecht, NL Le Guess Who? @Grand Hall
Tue 11/11/2025 Helsinki, FI G Livelab
Wed 11/12/2025 Tampere, FI G Livelab
Mon 11/17/2025 Berlin, DE Gretchen
Wed 11/19/2025 Gdansk, PL Monk Club @ KOT
Thu 11/20/2025 Warsaw, PL Jassmine
Sun 11/23/2025 Cagliari, IT Jazz In Sardegna
Wed 11/26/2025 London, UK Union Chapel
Thu 11/27/2025 Paris, FR Duc Des Lombards
Fri 11/28/2025 Paris, FR Duc Des Lombards
Sat 11/29/2025 Paris, FR Duc Des Lombards
Thu 02/26/2026 LPR, NYC