Rutgers–Newark To Celebrate International Jazz Day on RU-N's 80th Anniversary

April 30 is International Jazz Day, but Rutgers University–Newark will be celebrating more than music. It will mark a major campus milestone: the 80th anniversary of the date that Rutgers University merged with the University of Newark to become the institution it is now. 

Jazz will play a starring role in the April 30 celebration, with a nighttime jazz performance at Clement’s Place, the on-campus lounge that hosts up to 100 shows a year featuring world-class musicians. Performing that night will be John Lee & Friends featuring Grammy-nominated vocalist Roberta Gambarini. Lee is a legendary performer and bandleader who has headed Dizzy Gillespie's All Stars band.

Performances at Clement's Place, which are free and open to the public, are produced by the Institute of Jazz Studies, the university’s center for jazz research and education, which includes the world’s largest public jazz archive. 

The institute, which marks its 60th anniversary at Rutgers–Newark this year, is the premier destination for jazz scholarship. Located in the Dana Library, its vast collections span recordings, manuscripts, photographs, oral histories, and ephemera. Artifacts include Louis Armstrong’s diaries, Billie Holiday’s trademark gardenia, and Miles Davis’s green C-note trumpet. It houses more than 200,000 recordings and 6,000 books and periodicals.

“The fact that it belongs to Rutgers–Newark is fitting,” said Wayne Winborne, the executive director of the institute. “The Institute of Jazz Studies is emblematic of Rutgers–Newark’s standing as a city cultural hub that has international reach.”

For Winborne, the prominence of jazz in the university’s landmark year reflects a wider recognition of the genre. “It speaks to the enduring and constantly evolving nature of this art form and its continuing relevance to people,” he said.

Jazz, according to Winborne, shows people how they can engage with each other. “It’s both a metaphor and a model for democracy, community, and human connection,” he said. “It models ways in which very different people get to be their best and make their collective effort better.”

“It epitomizes what Rutgers–Newark is about. We’re part of a global phenomenon called jazz. We’re a leader and respected, but we have deep local ties. We manage to pull both off,” said Winborne. “We seek to have excellence at every level and be deeply connected to people. We don’t have these walls up between us and our neighbors.”

Founded in 1952 by musicologist and academic Marshall Stearns, the institute moved from Manhattan to Rutgers–Newark 60 years ago in an era when jazz had little presence in academia. At the time, Stearns taught medieval literature at Hunter College, which wasn’t eager to claim the materials he curated over the years.

“Why isn’t IJS in Manhattan? Because most established universities there didn’t consider jazz worthy of serious academic study and didn’t value the materials Stearns had amassed,” Winborne explains.

For students, the institute isn’t just a repository. It’s part of classroom learning.

“Students benefit in multiple ways,” Winborne said. “It’s really comprised of three areas—academic research, teaching music curriculum, and then public programming.”

Faculty across disciplines incorporate the archives into coursework, introducing students to primary-source research and the interpretive work that underpins scholarship. Classes such as Introduction to Jazz and The Art of Listening are designed to broaden students’ understanding of the music’s structure, history, and cultural significance.

“I don’t try to change what they like but figure out how to meet them where they are,” Winborne said. “Ultimately I would love for them to consume their music and art at a deeper level.”

The institute’s reach extends beyond the classroom through its public programming, most visibly at Clement’s Place, which has become a cornerstone of Newark’s contemporary jazz scene.

Since its official opening in 2016, the space has hosted roughly 75 to 100 performances each year. The schedule, which follows the academic calendar, regularly features multiple shows per week, alongside book talks, film screenings, and community events.

Artists who have appeared there recently include pianists Cyrus Chestnut, Bruce Barth; trombonist Delfeayo Marsalis; and vocalists Emma Larsson and Alexis Morrast, reflecting a mix of established and emerging talent. Programming also emphasizes innovation, with performances that blend jazz with other genres, including hip-hop and Latin traditions, and partnerships across Rutgers–Newark’s schools and departments.

Programming is connected to Newark’s own jazz legacy. Long a transportation hub with a diverse population—including Black, Jewish, and immigrant communities from Europe and Latin America—the city supported a thriving jazz scene through much of the 20th century.

Newark’s status as a brewery town lent itself to a thriving club scene. At its peak in the 1930s, more than 80 venues lined corridors such as Halsey Street, attracting musicians from across the region. The institute’s proximity to New York and Philadelphia continues to shape its work today, drawing artists who live nearby or pass through the area.

Jazz is rooted in the Black American experience, but it’s become a universal language, said Winborne. “It’s a global gift.''