Between a Smile and a Tear: A Tribute to Toots Thielemans features Toots’s heir apparent on the harmonica, Grégoire Maret, and Toots’s longtime pianist Kenny Werner. The Athenaeum had the good fortune to host three performances by Thielemans, a true musical icon and pioneer of the jazz harmonica. As those who followed Toots’s long career know, he preferred to play with musicians who had their own identities and who challenged him to continue to grow musically, right up to his passing, in 2016, at age 94. Toots took a special interest in Maret because he had his own sound and style, and while influenced by Toots, never sought to copy him. Accordingly, this tribute will feature songs Toots loved to play, including his standard “Bluesette,” but interpreted in new ways. As Maret puts it, the duo will “try to find new places where his spirit is truly honored but his music is being played through a new prism.”