Victor Goines writes music that feels lived in — like it carries the fingerprints of every porch, pew, second‑line parade route, and jam session that shaped him. Bach built cathedrals. Mozart spun whimsical stories. But Goines, a son of New Orleans and now President and CEO of Jazz St. Louis, composes from the crossroads of Blackness itself. He delves into the blues that raised listeners, the gospel that steadied them, the jazz that frees them, and the soul that keeps them honest.
This weekend, he brought all of that — and then some — to the sold-out big band premiere of his MLK Suite at Jazz St. Louis. Across nine movements, Goines offered a musical meditation on the life, legacy, and emotional landscape of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The result was an 80‑minute journey that felt both reverent and radically alive.
Each movement had its own personality. They began with “Michael, the Archangel” — a reference to Dr. King’s birth name. It shifted into “I Ain’t Gonna’ Stand fo’ This No Mo,’” a homage to Dr. King the reverend.
“Language of the Unheard” opened with a defiant staccato — horns colliding in hard‑bop bursts that echoed the righteous anger of a community pushed to the brink. It was the kind of musical dissonance that tells the truth without apology.
Then the Suite pivoted to the heart. “Mrs. King,” a movement added specifically for the St. Louis premiere, served as a love letter wrapped in melody. Before the band began, Goines told the audience, “Dr. King did great things, but he never would have done them without Coretta Scott King. I would never call him Martin, so I will never call her Coretta. We call this one ‘Mrs. King.’”
Guest soloist Wycliffe Gordon made his trombone deliver a tender ballad. The horns glowed softly, the piano whispered beneath them. It was an understated but haunting tribute to the woman behind the man behind a movement.
Throughout the Suite, Gordon’s horn became its own character — sometimes wailing like Mahalia Jackson, sometimes sighing like Billie Holiday, sometimes crooning with Sarah Vaughan’s velvet tone.
“Good Trouble,” inspired by the Selma marches, carried an upbeat gospel rhythm that gave the New Orleans‑style horn lines a place to land. It was protest music with a second‑line strut — the kind of groove that makes one nod while remembering why the fight mattered.
“Hold On, Save Us” shifted into something quieter but no less urgent. Gordon’s trombone voiced the exhaustion of a people forced to explain — again — why they deserve to feel at home in a country they helped build. It was civility wrapped around outrage, delivered with the kind of restraint that hits harder than shouting.
“The Long Hard Road” opened with the pluck of an upright bass — steady, intentional, like footsteps on pavement as Goines’ musical interpretation of the 1963 March on Washington. The band joined with a purposeful cadence, touched with Afro‑Cuban undertones, before the horns rose in a crescendo that reached toward the sky. Halfway through, the brass swelled into something almost symphonic before settling back into a gentle purr.
Then came the emotional apex: “When They Struck Him Down” flowing directly into “Yes, He Lives Forever.”
Goines explained the pairing: “In the New Orleans tradition, we mourn as we bury — but we celebrate because we know they’re going to a better place.”
The first movement opened with the type of percussion often associated with a military funeral, followed by somber horn lines that sounded like they belonged in a 1930s film at the moment a lover meets a tragic fate. Gordon’s trombone delivered a grief‑stricken wail — the kind that doubles someone over a casket. Goines’ clarinet added texture, while Pops Jackson’s left hand on the piano kept the waltz of sorrow moving forward.
Then — a pivot. A bright, church‑born organ chord. A bass line with bounce. A drum groove that said, “Get up — we march again.” “Yes, He Lives Forever” erupted into a jubilant second line, celebrating the eternal impact of Dr. King’s life.
Goines’ MLK Suite is quiet in its confidence but enormous in its emotional reach. It’s the kind of work that makes listeners imagine a film unfolding around it — not because it needs visuals, but because it paints them so vividly on its own. The piece reminds audiences that Dr. King’s legacy resonates far beyond the pages of history. Nearly 60 years after his assassination, Goines’ composition affirms that King’s life, message, and moral courage continue to move, challenge, and call people higher.