JAY LUSTIG
Christone “Kingfish” Ingram performs at The Morristown Jazz and Blues Festival, on Aug. 15.
You can usually count on a dynamic blues-rock singer-songwriter and guitar-slinger to close the Morristown Jazz and Blues Festival. Past headliners have included Samantha Fish, Walter Trout, Davy Knowles and Johnny A. For its 2026 edition — which took place on Aug. 15, outdoors on Morristown Green, with no admission charge — the festival managed to book not just a performer in that tradition, but someone who is, arguably, the most promising young (i.e., under 30) blues artist around today: Christone “Kingfish” Ingram, the Mississippi-born, 27-year-old Grammy winner, who has been described by Buddy Guy as “the next explosion of the blues.”
He didn’t disappoint, playing long, mesmerizing guitar solos but also showing an ability to write interesting songs in a variety of styles. In “Hard Times” (from his 2019 debut album Kingfish), he sang about “prices goin’ up down at the dollar store/Things we used to buy, we can’t buy no more”), and in the autobiographical “Not Gonna Lie,” from 2021’s 662 (named after the area code of his hometown, Clarksdale), he sang “Music was my way out from poverty and crime/I didn’t want to be like that, there’s more I had to find/Showing my frustration, I let my fingers fly/My guitar is what saved me, and I’m not gonna lie”).
“Nothin’ But Your Love,” from last year’s Hard Road, sounded like a classic soul ballad, while the set-closing 662 title track (another autobiographical song) was a rollicking romp, and the encore, “Catfish Blues,” was a classic-blues cover that brought things full circle, though Ingram performed it with a new, hard-driving arrangement that made it his own.
Ingram was joined by three musicians. Drummer Chris Black and bassist Randy Steven formed a solid rhythm section, while keyboardist Deshawn “D-Vibes” Alexander was the funky wild card in the mix, with his solos taking off in a wide variety of sonic directions in a way that reminded me of Parliament-Funkadelic member Bernie Worrell (though he also played in a more traditional piano-pumping style on “662”).
JAY LUSTIG
Dylan Triplett, in the crowd at The Morristown Jazz and Blues Festival.
Dylan Triplett, who performed immediately before Ingram, is another young blues-rock star. He is a St. Louis native, and his Who Is He? was named Best Emerging Artist Album in the 2023 Blues Music Awards. He is an energetic showman, but does not have as compelling a catalog of original songs as Ingram, and so his 90-minute set leaned heavily on covers, from John Lee Hooker’s “Boom Boom” to James Brown’s “It’s a Man’s Man’s Man’s World” and Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come.”
He ventured off of the stage and into the crowd to perform at one point — as members of LaBamba & the Hubcaps did, before him, and Ingram did, after him. He also gave ample soloing time to the virtuoso guitarist in his band, Kelton Cooper (of the New Jersey/New York-based group, Blues People), and generously let Cooper sing lead on one song, the traditional “Black Cat Bone.”
Playing in the middle of the festival’s five slots was LaBamba & the Hubcaps, once a staple of the New Jersey rock scene but now only occasionally reuniting for reunion gigs such as this one (singer-trombonist and bandleader Richie “LaBamba Rosenberg” now lives in California). LaBamba and his longtime musical partner Mark Pender (on trumpet and vocals) were joined by other veteran musicians such as guitarist Glenn Alexander, keyboardist Mike Mancini and bassist Steve Count, as well as Rosenberg’s children Reed and Jade. Reed is a percussionist and beatbox vocals master; Jade sang on some numbers, including a cover of George Gershwin/DuBose Heyward-written standard “Summertime” with an imaginative arrangement by LaBamba that made it sound like something off a Tom Waits album.
Mostly, though, the set was devoted to upbeat, good-time music: the Sam Cooke-written Asbury Jukes standard “Having a Party” (LaBamba and other Hubcaps have been longtime Jukes members), “Let the Good Times Roll,” the Sam & Dave hits “I Take What I Want” and “I Thank You” (sung as duets by LaBamba and Pender), the Edgar Winter Group’s classic-rock hit “Free Ride” (sung by Jade Rosenberg) and more.
JAY LUSTIG
From left, Glenn Alexander, Richie “LaBamba” Rosenberg and Mark Pender of LaBamba & the Hubcaps.
As is the norm for this festival, the No. 3 slot (which starts at 4 p.m.) is a kind of transition from the jazz that the festival presents in the morning and the louder, heavier blues-rock that comes in the evening. This year’s early bands were James Langton’s New York All-Star Big Band at noon, and Richard Baratta’s Gotham City Latin/Jazz Septet, at 2 p.m.
Langton, who sings and plays saxophone, shared much of the spotlight in his set with guest artists Dan Levinson, on clarinet and saxophone, and Molly Ryan, on guitar and vocals. Langton mentioned that Levinson has made a remarkable recovery from recent jaw surgery and is able to perform again at full strength; indeed, if he hadn’t said anything, I wouldn’t have realized that anything had been wrong.
The set was full of well-known instrumentals (“Sing, Sing, Sing,” “Begin the Beguine,” “One O’Clock Jump”) and songs (“Beyond the Sea” and “The Way You Look Tonight,” both sung by Langton, “Over the Rainbow” and “The Glory of Love,” both sung by Ryan, etc.), making it an ideal “welcoming” set for a festival that attracts a wide range of attendees — from young to old, and from jazz and blues fanatics to those who may not know much about these genres.
The vibe was generally mellow, while the intensity soon got turned up a notch by Baratta — a drummer who has returned to music after a successful career in movie production — and his band, with a set that included material like Charlie Parker’s “Now’s the Time” and “Moose the Mooche” and peaked, improbably, with a samba version of “Itsy Bitsy Spider.”
For updates on the 2027 festival, which does not have a date yet, visit morristownjazzandblues.com.
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