{"id":715127,"date":"2010-04-13T05:27:49","date_gmt":"2010-04-13T09:27:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.popcrunch.com\/?p=100285"},"modified":"2026-10-04T12:14:40","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T16:14:40","slug":"bandleader-kevin-eubanks-leaving-the-tonight-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/715127","title":{"rendered":"Bandleader Kevin Eubanks Leaving \u201cThe Tonight Show\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><object \nwidth=\"500\" height=\"333\" align=\"middle\"><param \nname=\"allowScriptAccess\" value=\"always\" \/><param \nname=\"allowFullScreen\" value=\"true\" \/><param \nname=\"movie\" value=\"http:\/\/widget.nbc.com\/videos\/nbcshort_at.swf?CXNID=1000004.10045NXC&#038;widID=4727a250e66f9723&#038;clipID=1218344&#038;showID=1\"\/><param \nname=\"bgcolor\" value=\"#000000\" \/><param \nname=\"quality\" value=\"high\" \/><\/object><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s official: <em>The Tonight Show with Jay Leno<\/em> is looking for a new bandleader.<\/p>\n<p>After 18 years, musician Kevin Eubanks has announced that he is leaving NBC&#8217;s flagship late-night program. Rubanks made the announcement during a taping of <em>The Tonight Show<\/em>, telling host Jay Leno that he was ready for a change of pace in his career.<\/p>\n<p><span\nid=\"more-100285\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;It&#8217;s a really difficult decision because this has become my second home, as it has been for the band. I love the audience, and the American people really love the show, and it&#8217;s been a wonderful experience to be here.&#8221; <\/em><\/p>\n<p>Eubanks, 52, who served as a comic sidekick to Leno as well as a guitarist, has been aboard since Leno took over <em>Tonight<\/em> in 1992. Eubanks became musical director when Branford Marsalis left in 1995.<\/p>\n<p>When asked about the highlights of his years, Eubanks fondly recalled <em>\u201cmeeting B.B. King, Willie Nelson, all these wonderful musicians that I\u2019ve grown to be friends with.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Kevin&#8217;s final day on <em>Tonight<\/em> is May 28.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s official: The Tonight Show with Jay Leno is looking for a new bandleader. After 18 years, musician Kevin Eubanks has announced that he is leaving NBC&#8217;s flagship late-night program. Rubanks made the announcement during a taping of The Tonight Show, telling host Jay Leno that he was ready for a change of pace in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3497,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4821],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-715127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9NivD-302j","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3497"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=715127"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715127\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":816621,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715127\/revisions\/816621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=715127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=715127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=715127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}