A Tribute to Wayne Shorter - Wiener Konzerthaus - Wien - 2026

Wiener Konzerthaus - Großer Saal, Wien

This concert celebrates the musical legacy of one of the 20th century’s most influential jazz musicians: An international all-star ensemble featuring Esperanza Spalding, Terri Lyne Carrington, Leo Genovese, and the Tonkünstler Orchestra of Lower Austria, conducted by Clark Rundell, will pay tribute to the works of saxophonist Wayne Shorter, who passed away in 2023.

Jazz Visionary
Wayne Shorter shaped modern jazz over seven decades—from Art Blakey and Miles Davis to the fusion band Weather Report. As a composer, he “changed jazz from the inside out,” writes Shorter’s biographer Michelle Mercer, “because his pieces are not merely themes for improvisation, but open, dramatic worlds. His music has shaped the language of modern jazz just as profoundly as that of Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, or John Coltrane.”
In his aesthetic thinking, Shorter defines music as an adventure without a fixed destination. He does not seek to convey a clear-cut message, but rather to open up a mental space. He loves open-ended meanings, science-fiction associations, Zen philosophy, and narrative ambiguity.

Musical Kindred Spirit
A deep musical kinship and close artistic friendship bound Wayne Shorter to the singer and bassist Esperanza Spalding, who pays tribute to his symphonic legacy at the Vienna Konzerthaus. Speaking about Shorter’s music, she says: “For a long time, we knew nothing about the vast interconnectedness of spruce forests or the fact that their underground root systems actually make them among the largest organisms on Earth. That’s how Wayne’s imagination feels to me. I can look at all the components of his music and understand how it works, but beneath or above that there’s a level that you can neither perceive nor analyze. You sense that there is something invisible there that gives rise to all this expression. And I think that’s exactly what makes Wayne and his music so exciting and so extraordinary.”