Next weekend, the Women in the Arts Festival will be back in East Lansing, and one of the headlining music acts on the schedule is a groundbreaking all-female jazz ensemble that's based in Detroit.
The Grammy Award-nominated ensemble Straight Ahead was the first all-female jazz group signed to Atlantic Records. The group has a long history of touring the U.S., Europe and the Caribbean.
The founding members are drummer Gayelynn McKinney, bassist Marion Hayden and pianist Alina Morr. The current lineup also includes Ingrid Racine on trumpet and singer Kymberli Wright.
According to Morr, their catalog could be described as a “gumbo” of music.
“We have the jazz. We have the blues. We have Latin. We have funk, and then we just are very open to the contemporary sound,” she said. “Because we have this tremendous background in all these different flavors, it’s something that we appear to be able to kind of flow into quite easily.”
Morr points out while all of the band members are women, Straight Ahead is more about the music and their skills rather than their backgrounds.
“When I was invited to join this particular group, the gender was almost second to me. It was really about the music. These were some very fine musicians that I felt I could learn a lot from.”
Still, in a business made up largely of men, there are advantages to working within a sisterhood.
“It’s been said that jazz is a fraternity, and it is. It was really nice to have a safe space as women musicians,” Morr explained.
“There is a certain gender experience that we share that makes it easy for us to come together and to create, but it is really nice to have your sorority sisters.”
This year marks the 40th year of the Women in the Arts Festival in East Lansing, supporting female artists from Mid-Michigan. Alina Morr is looking forward to the opportunity to play there.
“We’re just really glad to be a part of it, and I think it’s wonderful to highlight women in the arts, to show the accomplishments of all," she said. “I think it’s going to be a gathering of tremendous power and joy and strength, for us all to be together. You know, there’s a certain synergy that we get when we’re all together, that cannot be duplicated on screens or anything else.”
The 2025 Women in the Arts festival performance schedule includes The Rebel Eves on Friday, November 7 and Straight Ahead on Saturday, November 8. Both concerts start at 7:30 p.m. The festival also includes an artist market, food and more music on those dates. All events for the festival take place at Edgewood United Church in East Lansing.
UPCOMING ARTS EVENTS
Riverwalk Theatre is hosting two screenings of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" for Halloween on Friday at Grewal Hall in Lansing. Shows are at 6 and 9 p.m.
The annual MSU College of Music Spartan Spectacular program is Sunday at 3 p.m. at MSU’s Wharton Center.
