Scott Club and Foundry Hall are pleased to present the first concert of the 2026–2027 Scott Club Concert Series on Sunday, October 25, featuring Sunny Wilkinson & Ron Newman, an accomplished jazz vocal and piano duo whose warmth, musicianship, and artistry promise a delightful hour-long performance of live music. A reception will follow the performance. Thanks to the new lift, the concert space is accessible!
In person at Scott Club: RSVP by Oct 23 (required) to: info@scottclub.org
Livestream: Foundry Hall Twitch channel: https://www.twitch.tv/foundryhall
Concerts are FREE and open to ALL!
Sunny Wilkinson is an acclaimed jazz vocalist, recording artist, and educator whose career has taken her from Los Angeles recording studios and jazz clubs to concert stages and universities across the country. She has performed with an impressive roster of musicians, including The Count Basie Band, Ron Carter, Clark Terry, Curtis Fuller, Kenny Wheeler, Milt Hinton, and Gene Bertoncini.
Her recordings include Alegria, High Wire, Into the Light, and A Gentle Time, When Sunny Meets Tom. In addition to performing, Sunny has made significant contributions to jazz education, teaching at Michigan State University, Western Michigan University, Cal State Northridge, and other institutions. She also founded “Sisters in Jazz,” a mentoring program created to give young women jazz musicians a voice and platform.
Don Mizell, co-producer of Ray Charles, Genius Loves Company, praised Sunny as “a master songstress able to get inside of a song and find its essential emotional core.”
Ron Newman is a pianist, composer, arranger, and retired Professor of Music Theory at Michigan State University, where he joined the faculty in 1979. He earned his Bachelor of Music degree from North Texas State University and his Master of Music and Ph.D. in Music Composition from MSU.
Newman served as MSU’s first Director of Jazz Studies from 1979 to 1995 and taught jazz improvisation, arranging, pedagogy, and history before joining the university’s Music Theory Area. He is a past president of the Michigan Chapter of the National Association of Jazz Educators and a recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Commissioning Consortium Award.
As a pianist, Newman has been an active performer and composer in both jazz and classical music. He and Sunny have been musical partners for more than three decades, performing, writing, arranging, and recording together.
Together, Wilkinson and Newman bring decades of musical partnership to an intimate vocal-and-piano performance shaped by jazz, artistry, and the unmistakable chemistry of two musicians who know one another extraordinarily well.
This concert is presented in collaboration with Foundry Hall and supported in part by Low Family Foundation, Michigan Arts and Culture Council, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
