WORTON — In accepting this year’s Tony Award for best performance by an actress in a featured role in a musical, “Hell’s Kitchen” star Kecia Lewis on June 16 gave a shout-out to her vocal coach Marlon Saunders.
Yeah, that Marlon Saunders.
The supremely talented singer, songwriter, record producer and now playwright who grew up in Kent County, attended local public schools, graduated from Berklee College of Music in Boston and has gone on — as they say in the business — to make it big.
He’s the CEO and founder of The Seamless Voice, a vocal coaching and artist consulting company.
From 2015 to 2017, he toured with Stevie Wonder on The Songs In The Key of Life Tour as choir director.
He has served as a vocal contractor for Sam Smith, Bastille, Logic, Mondo Cozmo and Andrea Bocelli.
And, he appears in the film “Enchanted” as The Calypso Singer who sings the Academy Award-nominated song “How You Know” with Amy Adams.
If you want to hear the voice behind the voice that helped to make Kecia Lewis a Tony Award winner — he’s also an acclaimed singer in his own right — then Red Acres Farm in Worton is the place to be Saturday night, Sept. 7 when Marlon returns home for a concert.
The cost is $20 at the gate; you can pay by cash, check or Venmo.
Two food trucks will be on-site, but concert-goers also can bring their own refreshments.
Seating will be available, but you also can bring your own lawn chairs.
Red Acres Farm is located in the 25000-block of Lambs Meadow Road, adjacent to Kent County High School.
The concert starts at 7 p.m.
It’s a rain or shine event.
As an added attraction, published local authors Stephanie Lindsay (“Overhome”) and Terwana Brown (“Healed by Faith” and “Living My Life In Reverse”) will have copies of their books for sale.
This will be Marlon’s third concert at Red Acres, a Century Farm owned by the Williams family.
Marlon grew up in Big Woods and also spent a lot of time with relatives in Butlertown, which is about a mile down the road from Red Acres Farm.
Bryan Williams, representing the fifth generation of the Red Acres family, and Marlon have been friends since their Little League baseball days — Marlon played for Kennedyville while Bryan played for Worton.
Their years at Kent County High School overlapped, with Bryan graduating in 1982 and Marlon in ’83.
Marlon played the saxophone in the high school’s Brigade of Blue marching band.
“I’ve always admired Marlon because of his talent, his professionalism and his all-around knowledge of music,” Bryan told The Evening Enterprise in a phone interview Tuesday.
“Whenever his parents [James and Cheryl] would come up to the farm, I was always asking for Marlon. And once our venue barn was done in 2020, I told them that my goal was to get Marlon here to perform.”
That message was passed along and at Christmastime 2020, while visiting family in Kent County, Marlon reached out to Bryan.
“He came to the farm and was sold” on the concert idea, Bryan said.
Marlon made his Red Acres debut the following September.
He returned in 2022.
After missing last year because of a commitment at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, Marlon is back this year.
Last week, having just returned from Nashville, Tennessee and Muscle Shoals, Alabama, he graciously consented to an interview by email with The Evening Enterprise.
That interview is printed here.
What types of music will you be performing?
The music I will be performing will be some R&B, soul, jazz, pop and gospel. All familiar music that will keep the crowd happy and dancing!
Who else will be performing?
I am very excited for this performance and I will, as I have in the past, include some of our local talent.
Kent County is blessed with having many talented artists in the county and having some of them join me at Red Acres on September 7th is great.
My rhythm section will feature my cousins who I grew up playing with in church — Chris Copper (musical director and drummer), Wayman Blackston (bass) and Keith Wilson (guitar) — and my friend and colleague from Japan, Jiro Yoshida on guitar.
Heidi Williams DeFabritus will be a guest vocalist, and my cousin Rhonda Boyer will be a featured vocalist.
On background vocals and also stepping out as lead vocals, I am happy to have Karen Somerville, Portia Turner and Jerome McKinney singing with me.
A great highlight will be the ladies who I worked with in the musical work I created, “ISAAC: A Musical Journey, ” Sue Matthews, Kelly Sloan and Biti Strauchn.
So happy they all will be performing!
Tell us about the band that will accompany you.
The band is mainly local talent and most of the local talent are my cousins. We grew up together singing and playing music while attending Mt. Olive A.M.E. Church in Butlertown.
I love doing this gig at Red Acres because I get to come home and play with these wonderful musicians that I have known my entire life. We grew up playing music together so we have a connection and vibe that is understood and felt very easily.
Jiro Yoshida and I have toured the world together on various projects and have recorded on more than 300 recordings together.
It is great to have him join us again.
What’s it like to be returning “home?”
I love returning home and collaborating with Bryan Williams to perform at Red Acres. It truly is nice to be around friends and family. It really feels so good to have that synergy with an audience from home.
I love the acoustics at Red Acres! It is nice to have the outside feeling and to be in that open space. The sound travels nicely and the acoustics in the covered space at Red Acres where the band performs is really good and warm.
Congratulations on getting the shout-out at the Tony Awards.
Thank you very much.
I am so happy and proud of Kecia Lewis for her Tony win. It was a very nice surprise to get that shout-out and it really felt good to hear it!
It is cool to have the vocal coaching part of my business be collaborated with Broadway productions. I work with a lot of really great Broadway actors/performers and it feels really good to attend a Broadway show and watch their magic.
What are you currently doing?
I live in Staten Island, New York and most of my work in the area is in Manhattan.
I spend a good amount of time on the road as well.
I am currently working on a new recording with the band I co-created with John Pondel and Warren Rosenstein in 1994. Our band, Jazzhole, signed to Atlantic Records and our first recording dropped February 21st, 1994 — 30 years ago this year! So we are releasing a new recording celebrating our 30 years of creating and performing together.
We have just returned from Muscle Shoals, Alabama working in the famous FAME [the acronym for Florence Alabama Music Enterprises] Recording Studios.
I am a co-founder of a new-tech platform titled “Jelly,” which we are eagerly working to bring to market.
I am also a full-time professor at The New School of Jazz and Contemporary Music [in New York City’s Greenwich Village].
Then there is also writing the book and creating new music for the work “ISAAC: A Musical Journey,” and somewhere in there I spend time with family and friends, and sleep.
