The piano is the X factor. People have a tough time following the structures when there's no piano there, spelling it out. It makes it more easily understood, particularly to people who don't know as much about music.

Other big band experience with Lionel Hampton and Clark Terry followed over the next year and by the end of 1981 Marsalis on alto saxophone had joined his brother Wynton in Blakey’s Jazz Messengers. created the concept of a Musicians’ Village in the city’s Upper Ninth Ward with the Ellis Marsalis Center for Music as the Village’s centerpiece. In June 2011 after working together for over 10 years in a band setting Branford Marsalis and Joey Calderazzo released their first duo album titled Songs of Mirth and Melancholy on Branford's label Marsalis Music.

Branford Marsalis (born August 26 1960) is an American saxophonist composer and bandleader.