We’ve been getting a lot of mentions in the press lately, with welcome recognition of the contribution Tomorrow’s Warriors has made to the British jazz scene, and specifically the London scene. For some time, those in the know – like music website EZH, and radio shows like Worldwide FM and GW Jazz’s Jazz In The Present Tense –have given Tomorrow’s Warriors credit, but with our alumni now out there on the world stage, spreading the word with their amazing music, the news has gone international! Other training grounds like our friends at Jazz Re:freshed and Kinetika Bloco are getting some love too, and we’re glad people are recognising the grassroots of this musical movement. It’s definitely a very exciting time to be in jazz.
“But the backstory was that of Tomorrow’s Warriors, the UK jazz-education organisation founded by Gary Crosby and Janine Irons in 1991. That inspirational venture nurtured the now spiralling jazz careers of McCormack and George, as well as a raft of local heroes including Jason Yarde and Soweto Kinch before them. The Tomorrow’s Warriors vision of a jazz party anyone can join, regardless of background, culture, gender or education, and making music anyone can tune into, glowed all around this gig.”
John Fordham | The Guardian
“One of the most prominent of these groups is Tomorrow’s Warriors, who, in addition to a number of other activities, run high-level music workshops and live events, with a special focus on the African diaspora and girls. If you want to know who passed through their doors, it might just be easier to ask who didn’t: The list is long and comprehensive.”
Emma Warren | Red Bull Music Academy
“An important shoutout needs to go to Tomorrow’s Warriors…who have mentored a lot of the new generation, from Nubya Garcia to Zara McFarlane.”
Gilles Peterson | The Guardian
“And a few have been instrumental in helping the new generation blossom – most specifically, bassist Gary Crosby…whose youth-music program, Tomorrow’s Warriors, counts an overwhelming percentage of the current scene’s players as graduates… In fact, for many, jazz is the grounding, and Tomorrow’s Warriors, the place where they first became grounded. To a person, they cite the workshop co-founded by Crosby and Janine Irons in 1991 as the place they not only discovered their community, but also first realized they could remake the jazz scene in their own image. “Its ethos is creating, supporting and furthering the diversity of the music, with a push towards ethnic minorities and women,” says Nubya Garcia. She was a saxophone-playing 17-year-old when she walked into her first Tomorrow’s Warriors session. The differences with previous jazz-education experiences were striking: “It was the first time someone had gone on feeling over chops,” she says. “But also, I wasn’t the only woman in the room, and it was predominantly black.”
Piotr Orlov | Rolling Stone
And still they rise…!