THE BRONX — Jazz at Lincoln Center will kick off its 2015-16 season in Bedford Park.
The first concert of the season for Wynton Marsalis' famed orchestra will take place on Sept. 12 at 8 p.m. at Lehman Center for the Performing Arts and feature the debut of new arrangements and compositions by Carlos Henriquez, bassist for the band and a Bronx native.
Henriquez's strong connection to The Bronx is one of the main reasons why the orchestra decided to start its season in the borough this year, according to a spokeswoman for Jazz at Lincoln Center.
The Bronx bassist was performing with jazz greats including Tito Puente by age 14 and was a member of the band that won the first-ever Essentially Ellington High School Jazz Band Festival and Competition.
However, the players are also leaving the confines of Lincoln Center due to work on a redesign of the building's public spaces, which will leave the orchestra's two main theaters inaccessible through the end of November.
This is the first time Jazz at Lincoln Center will open its season in The Bronx and the first time it will not start off in its own space since the center opened Rose Hall in 2004, the spokeswoman said.
The orchestra will return to Lincoln Center for its holiday shows in mid-December. In the meantime, it will continue to explore the rest of the city with an Oct. 23 show at The Town Hall on West 43rd Street and a Nov. 21 show at Symphony Space on Broadway and West 95th Street.
This is the 28th season for Jazz at Lincoln Center, and the theme of it is "Jazz and American Song," a relationship that Marsalis described as mutually beneficial.
"The early American songwriters discovered in jazz and the blues, methods and materials to further Americanize their songs," he said in a statement. "And in the superbly crafted body of melodies and harmonies of the American Popular Songbook, the early jazz musicians found suitable thematic material for more extended development through the art of jazz."
Tickets for this season's concerts can be purchased at jazz.org or the Lincoln Center Box Office at Broadway and 60th Street. People can also get tickets through CenterCharge at 212-721-6500.
