Rick Braun Plays Chuck Mangione (7:30pm)

Over three decades, 20+ albums and more than 20 #1 Billboard hits into one of contemporary jazz’s most inspiring, prolific and genre-defining careers, Rick Braun pours his creative heart and soul into his first-ever tribute album, paying homage to one of his all-time musical heroes on Rick Braun Plays Chuck Mangione. Upon Mangione’s passing in July 2025, the veteran trumpeter and flugelhornist – with the help of his son, Kyle – reflected upon the legendary artist with a thoughtful Facebook post featuring an impromptu performance of the Grammy winning Billboard Top 5 classic “Feels So Good” accompanied by a powerful personal memory of the one time he met Mangione in person. In 2007, when both Mangione and Braun (with BWB) were performing the Long Beach Jazz Festival, Braun mustered the courage to knock on the door of the icon’s trailer and introduce himself. Mangione greeted him warmly and the two talked of their mutual connection to the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY, where Mangione earned his degree and later returned to become a professor and first director of the Eastman Jazz Ensemble, leaving the year before Braun enrolled as a student there. Before Braun left to get ready for his show, Mangione bestowed an incredible gift upon him – his cherished Giardinelli flugelhorn mouthpiece with “CM” inscribed on it. Braun never saw Mangione again, but he played his own horns with the mouthpiece every so often. When he decided, not long after posting the Facebook video, t…