Jazz at Lincoln Center's second annual The Unity Jazz Festival features an intergenerational lineup of more than 20 emerging acts, rising icons, and cherished legends of the music on four stages.
One of the headliners, Rachael & Vilray, will perform on both nights of the festival, January 10-11, 2025 (Friday night as a duo and Saturday night with a Big Band) at Frederick P. Rose Hall.
Showcasing the talents of Lake Street Dive singer Rachael Price and Brooklyn guitarist and vocalist Vilray Blair Bolles, Rachael & Vilray perform their original songs inspired by classic jazz as well as traditional Tin-Pan Alley-style pop. Their debut in 2019 featured guest Jon Batiste. The duo’s second album in 2023 I Love a Love Song has received rave reviews.
Rachael & Vilray spoke to WBGO's Doug Doyle about their rising success and upcoming gig at The Unity Jazz Festival.
Rachael & Vilray are a perfect example of the idea that sometimes what that once seemed old fashioned can actually resonate as new again. Rachael Price is best known as the singer in the Grammy-nominated band Lake Street Dive. She and Vilray met at the New England Conservatory in Boston
two decades ago. But it would take them years before they discovered their mutual love of the Great American Songbook standards from the ‘30s and ‘40s, and decided to create a project to showcase Vilray’s special gift of channeling classic songwriters in his original music.
Rachael Price says performing with her friend Vilray has been a thrill.
"I love singing with Vilray. I think our voices work well with each other. I don't think we ever get in each other's way. Vilray is an incredibly swinging and sensitive guitar player. He's always going to serve the song. He always follows me. If I need a song to go a little bit faster or slow down, I know that Vilray is going to be right there with me. I don't think anybody plays guitar like Vilray anymore. The cool thing about the way Vilray plays is that it's not something you come across that often and you never really heard it solo. That's not like a thing from the '40's. I think that one of the things that I really get and the audience gets when they hear it is that you're hearing a style of jazz guitar playing that usually would have been blended in the band, and you get to hear it just bare and it's very exciting."
Performing with Price is just as magical for Vilray.
"It's the most special thing in the world. It's the best when Rachael is taking a solo or we're in the recording studio and not singing at the same time, there's a lot that I'm thinking about that maybe removes me from thinking about how special this is or how lovely Rachael is sounding. But when I can stand back and play the chords and not be singing when she takes a solo, or standing in a recording booth as she lays down a track, those are the moments that I really wake up to the idea that this is incredibly special, knowing a song that started off in my bedroom with me singing a little demo has come to life in this extraordinary way and really hit the heights."
Is Vilray and "old soul"?
"I've definitely heard that said since I was a little kid, but I don't know what it means (laughs). I guess I won't own it but I certainly do like old-fashioned things. I don't like I like them because they're old-fashioned. I think there's a certain vibrancy that's in touch with humanity that existed in the recordings of a prior period that sometimes I feel is missing from modern recordings. It's not that it's old-fashioned, it's just something that's very alive to me actually."
Price is looking forward to The Unity Jazz Festival for many reasons.
"The venue and there's going to be so many young and new acts. Vilray and I are still feeling like do we belong? We still kind of see ourselves in those tiny little bars playing for 30 people, so anytime we get opportunities like this we're sort of blown away that we're wanted. We're excited. On one of the nights we're going to have a whole band with us that we have just made a new record with."
Vilray says the new record is influenced a lot by musicals of the '50s and '60s and also sort of West Coast cool jazz of the late 40's and early 50's.
"It's kind of unusual instrumentation with two saxophones, baritone sax and alto and soprano switching off and trombone, so those are the three horns. There's no piano. It's a vibraphone, bass, drums and myself on guitar."
Rachael Price was born in Australia and Price was born in Australia and raised in Hendersonville, Tennessee. So how did jazz enter her life?
"I really think it was when I was five or six years old when I got my first Ella Fitzgerald album. I don't know what it was about Ella Fitzgerald, but I knew that was how I wanted to sing. So that's all I did for many years was just copy her and eventually realized I should listen to other jazz singers and figure out my own style. I grew up in a musical household. My dad's a choir conductor, so I was going to choir practice since I was an infant. It was weird when I was auditioning for a talent show in high school. Jazz was the only thing in my repertoire. I would audition for the Country Christmas shows at Opryland because I grew up in Nashville. They would always tell me that I sounded way to old to be a child singing. They were like we can't cast you because we want little kids singing Christmas songs and you sound like you're trying to sound like an aging woman. It's nice to get to an age in my life where I actually look how I sound."
One of Vilray's inspirations is the late jazz saxophonist, trumpeter and composer Ornette Coleman.
"Ornette was a master of both of melody and humor. Even something like "Lonely Woman" which is such an impassioned, emotional and some would say dark song, Ornette can't help but impart his own personality which as a lot of brightness, lightness and humor in it. I always really admired the melodicism and the freeness of Ornette's approach. When I was first writing, I was definitely writing more instrumental music that was more in line with free improvisation. As you grow up and realize there's not that many people who want to listen to free improvisation, if it touched you at some point, it continues to touch your and inform your music for sure. I still love Ornette."
The guitarist and singer also loves when younger listeners relate to the songs of Rachael & Vilray.
"I have a YouTube channel and occasionally I'll get a comment like 'thank you so much for introducing me to the existence of this kind of music and guitar playing. I know that experience from being a teenager myself getting into jazz. You just start tumbling down the hill and there's just a whole ocean of beautiful music to discover. Music that I love very much."
You can SEE the entire interview with Rachael & Vilray here.
2025 The Unity Jazz Festival Lineup:
All performances take place at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall.
Friday, January 10th
6:30-7:50 p.m. Pedrito Martinez and Alfredo Rodriguez - Stage: Ertegun Atrium
6:45-7:45 p.m. Chien-Chien Lu & Richie Goods - Stage: VLS Acoustic Lounge
7:00-8:30 p.m. Rachael & Vilray - Stage: Appel Room
7:30-8:45 p.m. Domo Branch Trio feat. Imani Rousselle - Stage: Dizzy's Club
8:15-9:15 p.m. Miguel Zenon & Luis Perdomo - Stage: VLS Acoustic Lounge 8:30-
9:50 p.m. TBA - Stage: Ertegun Atrium
9:30-10:30 p.m. Young Monk Project feat. Erena Terakubo, Jocelyn Gould, Miki Yamanaka, Liany Mateo and Domo Branch - Stage: Dizzy's Club
9:30-11:00 p.m. Sun Ra Celebration with Sullivan Fortner & His Galactic Friends - Stage: Appel Room
9:45-10:45 p.m. Cameron Campbell Trio - Stage: VLS Acoustic Lounge
10:30-11:50 p.m. Tatiana Eva-Marie - Stage: Ertegun Atrium 11:15-12:30 a.m.
11:15-12:30 a.m. Mitch Frohman & The Bronx Horns - Stage: Dizzy's Club
Saturday, January 11th
6:30-7:50 p.m. Christine Jensen Jazz Orchestra feat. Ingrid Jensen - Stage: Ertegun Atrium
6:45-7:45 p.m. Allyn Johnson: The Magic of Bud - Stage: VLS Acoustic Lounge
7:00-8:30 p.m. All-Star Tribute to Roy Haynes with Dee Dee Bridgewater, Dave Holland, Graham Haynes, Marcus Gilmore, Terri Lyne Carrington, John Patitucci, Dave Kikoski, Jaleel Shaw, Kenny Barron, and more - Stage: Appel Room
7:30-8:45 p.m. Leon Foster Thomas - Stage: Dizzy's Club
8:15-9:15 p.m. The Westerlies - Stage: VLS Acoustic Lounge 8:30-9:50 p.m. Future of Jazz Orchestra - Stage: Ertegun Atrium
9:30-10:45 p.m. Georgia Heers Quartet - Stage: Dizzy's Club
9:30-11:00 p.m. Rachael & Vilray Big Band -Stage: Appel Room
9:45-10:45 p.m. Nicole Glover Trio -Stage: VLS Acoustic Lounge
10:30-11:50 p.m. Helen Sung Big Band - Stage: Ertegun Atrium
11:15 p.m.-12:30 a.m. Emmet Cohen presents Tootie Fest! - Stage: Dizzy's Club
The Unity Jazz Festival Day Passes can be purchased through jazz.org 24 hours a day or through CenterCharge at 212-721-6500, open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. Tickets can also be purchased at the Jazz at Lincoln Center Box Office, located on Broadway at 60th Street, Ground Floor. Jazz at Lincoln Center Box Office hours are: Tuesday-Sunday: 12:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
