Chi-Town Trumpet Summit concerts

About Chi-Town Trumpet Summit

Chi-Town Trumpet Summit is a Chicago jazz collective led by trumpeter Marques Carroll, built for the city’s club circuit and centered on multiple trumpet voices. Its calling card is unusually concrete: the group documented its Andy’s Jazz Club residency on a 2018, 11-track live album running two hours and five minutes, preserving an extended-set format whose material moves between trumpet repertoire and the players’ own compositions.

A residency becomes a band

The Summit grew from Chicago’s working-jazz ecosystem around Carroll, a St. Louis-born trumpeter who studied jazz performance at DePaul and established his professional base in Chicago. Public materials identify Carroll as the leader and describe the personnel as Chicago brass players, with rotating trumpet pairings central to the format. A formation year and fixed founding lineup remain uncredited in the group’s official biography. Its first documented release arrived as the live album In Stride We Keep Steppin’, recorded at Andy’s Jazz Club and issued in 2018.

One live document, built at length

In Stride We Keep Steppin’ (Live at Andy’s Jazz Club) (2018, JMarq Records) is the Summit’s debut and its defining release. Apple Music lists the album as an 11-song, two-hour-and-five-minute collection released February 2, 2018; Carroll’s site identifies it as a JMarq release recorded live at Andy’s. The scale matters: this is a club program presented in full-length pieces, leaving room for ensemble arrangements and improvisational development across a substantial set.

The repertoire maps the group’s purpose with precision. Carroll’s notes name tributes to Roy Hargrove, Nicholas Payton, and Wynton Marsalis alongside originals, while Andy’s current description extends that honor roll to Freddie Hubbard and Lee Morgan. Tracks including “Speak No Evil,” “Silver’s Serenade,” “The Bell Ringer,” and “Oriental Folksong” place standards and trumpet-centered repertoire beside Carroll-associated originals such as “Absolutions,” “Peyote,” “In the Zone,” and “The Double Up.” The record changes the proposition from a single-horn leader date into a collective forum for contrasting trumpet approaches.

For a prospective attendee, the album functions as the clearest available guide: expect material with historical jazz anchors, a brass-forward arrangement concept, and set-length pacing. The Summit’s public discography centers on this live document, so its recorded identity and its concert identity remain closely joined.

Carroll’s wider Chicago network

The Summit sits inside Carroll’s wider network as a bandleader, educator, and label co-founder. He co-founded JMarq Records, leads the Marques Carroll Quintet, co-leads the Chicago Soul Jazz Collective, and serves as a permanent substitute member of the Count Basie Orchestra, according to his official biography. Those roles give the Summit a connection to Carroll’s original writing and to a broad pool of Chicago collaborators, while the group itself operates as a distinct trumpet-centered project.

What the Andy’s date tells you

This is a repeat-venue live proposition with a defined structure. Andy’s describes Carroll joined by rotating pairs of trumpet players, performing music associated with Hubbard, Marsalis, and Morgan alongside material by individual Summit players. The club schedules the Summit in two 75-minute sets, 6:00–7:15 p.m. and 8:15–9:30 p.m.; reservations apply to one show at a time, and the room clears between sets. That setup favors a focused early or late club set over an all-night bill.

The return pattern is unusually visible. Andy’s calendar lists Summit dates on August 4, August 18, and September 1, 2026, each with two sets, while WDCB logged further Andy’s engagements on June 2, July 7, and July 21. DownBeat describes Andy’s as a 140-seat supper-club setting, placing this music in a close-range listening room. The available record supports a Chicago residency pattern, with Andy’s as the recurring venue and rotating personnel as the live variable.

The next dates

The latest documented Chi-Town Trumpet Summit release remains 2018’s In Stride We Keep Steppin’ (Live at Andy’s Jazz Club), and the project’s current public activity is concentrated at Andy’s. CrowdMate lists two sets on Tuesday, August 18, 2026, at 6:00 p.m. and 8:15 p.m., followed by two more on Tuesday, September 1, at the same times. Andy’s and the Jazz Institute of Chicago list the August 18 performances, while Andy’s calendar confirms the September 1 return. Each date offers the same two-set choice, so arrival time shapes the evening’s listening window.

Start here

Start with “Absolutions” for an extended original in the live-set frame; “Speak No Evil” for the Summit’s engagement with jazz repertoire; and “The Double Up” for a concise introduction to its brass-centered, collective identity.

Sources

1. Music — Marques Carroll
2. About — Marques Carroll
3. In Stride We Keep Steppin' (Live at Andy's Jazz Club) — Apple Music
4. 2nd Set With Chi-Town Trumpet Summit — Andy's Jazz Club
5. Calendar — Andy's Jazz Club
6. Events Calendar (jazz) — 90.9 FM WDCB
7. Club Listings — Jazz Institute of Chicago
8. February 2026 — DownBeat