Stanton Moore Blends New Orleans Jazz and Funk in Trio Performances

Stanton Moore channels New Orleans roots into genre-fluid jazz, balancing deep hometown traditions with forward-looking modern rhythms on the drums.

Drummer Stanton Moore had an early start in music, watching and eventually drumming in the Mardi Gras parades of New Orleans, KNKX Public Radio reported. “My mom would bring me to Mardi Gras parades. There’s pictures of me dressed up in a clown outfit at the age of eight months old,” he said.

Moore is best known as a founding member of the modern funk group Galactic, though he also plays heavy metal and traditional jazz born in his hometown.

During a 2015 visit to KNKX Public Radio, Moore’s trio featuring David Torkanowski on piano and James Singleton on bass showcased that versatile range. Moore explained during that broadcast that his career in music was settled before he even owned a proper drum set because he was filled with rhythm.

“Just eventually started hitting on, you know, Tupperware and boxes and Rubbermaid stuff and pots and pans and you know whatever I could get my hands on, and my parents eventually figured it’d probably be cheaper to buy me a drum than let me keep destroying all their pots and pans,” Moore said.

While Moore loves the jazz tradition, his musical curiosity has steered him toward genre-fluid styles. Singleton said that this exact curiosity sits at the center of how New Orleans jazz was created and how it continues to evolve.

“It’s always been a place of a fervent reaching forth for the new thing, and that still continues all the time. It’s it’s really the huge overriding story of living in New Orleans is the tradition and the forward-looking people who are trying to change it,” said James Singleton, bassist.”

Moore explained that the formation of his trio was designed to bring together his varied tastes within a focused piano-and-drums format. The group honed their craft at weekly gigs at Snug Harbor Jazz Bistro on Frenchman Street.

“When I wanted to put together a piano trio, I wanted to put something together that we could swing out. We could play jazz, but we could also play funk and dip into the street beat stuff, the New Orleans stuff,” Moore said.

Beyond musical exploration, Moore pointed to a practical reason for touring with this specific trio format. Unlike larger outfits such as Galactic, this configuration allows the musicians to settle into a city for multiple nights at venues like Dimitrio’s Jazz Alley.

“I like coming here, getting a few days where I can, you know, assimilate into the into the community,” Moore said.

During these performances, Moore’s trio regularly plays “Magnolia Triangle,” an early New Orleans funk tune written by fellow drummer James Black. The piece serves as a foundational odd-meter standard featuring a five-beat groove that feels like a modern extension of traditional second line drumming.

“James, you know, could play anything. He was a great funk musician, was a great jazz musician and an incredible composer, and back in the early-’60s, he wrote a batch of tunes that are still challenging to this day, still very modern and looking forward,” Moore said.

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