“I want to impress upon the listening public that this is the end of an era for New York Voices — the chance of a lifetime to hear them live,” says Gold Company director Greg Jasperse.
The acclaimed vocal jazz quartet New York Voices joins Western Michigan University’s Gold Company for two concerts this Friday and Saturday, April 10–11, at 7:30 p.m. in the Dalton Center Recital Hall. The performances mark a historic milestone: New York Voices is retiring at the end of 2026 after a career spanning nearly four decades, making these their final appearances in Kalamazoo as WMU Jazz Masters guest artists.
Speaking from Boston, where the group is currently on tour, members Darmon Meader and Lauren Kinhan join Jasperse and Cara Lieurance to reflect on a relationship with Gold Company that stretches back to 1988. That year, then-Gold Company director Steve Zegree discovered the group — before they even had a record deal — at a Greenwich Village club called Visiones and invited them to Kalamazoo as the first stop on their debut tour…