Thursday, August 16, 2012, 7:00 PM
Jazzmobile
Louis Armstrong House & Archives
34-56 107th Street
Corona, Queens, NY
FREE!
Jazz pianist Arturo O’Farrill is the former band leader of the Grammy Award winning Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra. Mr. O’Farrill had also composed music for Machito and Benny Goodman’s Bebop Orchestra. He was also a resident musician at Birdland jazz club in New York City.
Friday, August 20, 2010 7:00 PM
Jazzmobile
Jackie Robinson Park
89 Bradhurst Avenue
New York, NY
The jazz quartet Jazzberry Jam member’s Bertha Hope (piano), Kim Clarke (bass), Sue Terry (sax) and Paula Hampton (drums) have been together since 1975. They have performed at many notable events and appear in the French documentary “Les Femmes du Jazz.”
FREE!
Wednesday, August 18, 2010 7:00 PM
Jazzmobile
Grant’s Tomb
122nd Street & Riverside Drive
Hailing from Osaka, Japan, the Hammond Organist, Akiko Tsuruga is in a center stage of New York jazz scene since 2001. This talented young organist began to play organ at the age of three and started off her career right after her graduation from Osaka College of Music. While she was based in Osaka, she had numerous opportunities to play with renowned jazz men from the United States such as Roy Hargrove, Jeff “Tain” Watts, and Grady Tate to name a few.(Source)
FREE!
Thursday, August 13, 2010 7:00 PM
Jazzmobile
Jackie Robinson Park
89 Bradhurst Avenue
New York, NY
Born in New Orleans, Powell first took up drums, but was immediately attracted to the trombone when he first saw one played in a marching band. “I was fascinated by this shiny instrument and this guy parading down the street playing it. I couldn’t take my eyes off of him,” he told Bob Bernotas (Online Trombone Journal, 1997). By age 14, he was gigging around Crescent City with a band of other teen musicians, and by 16 was on the road with the King Kolax Band. He joined Lionel Hampton’s band soon after. Moving to New York in 1951, he was playing at the Apollo Theater when he was tapped for a trombone opening in the Count Basie Band, a position he held for the next 12 years. More than 30 years later, Benny noted that “People still ask me, ‘Is the band in town?’ And I left the band in 1963! So, you know, people very much associate me with the band and I’m proud to say that, because it’s opened a lot of doors for me. When I got my first Broadway show or my first television show, it was because I had been with Count Basie and they figured, ‘If he was with Count Basie’s band for 12 years, this guy must know something.’”
Powell ultimately left the Basie band to make his way as a soloist. “We all have to eventually leave big bands if we want to be soloists,” he told Bob Bernotas. “So it’s not so much that I wanted to start my own band. It’s just that I didn’t get the opportunity to play that much with Basie’s band.” In Los Angeles in the mid 1970s, Powell connected with Randy Weston, with whom he would perform regularly through the end of the century. While in California, he also worked in the orchestra of the Merv Griffin Show. Over the years he also worked with Harry “Sweets” Edison, whom he regarded as a mentor; the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, Abdullah Ibrahim, Frank Foster, Benny Carter, Duke Pearson, John Carter, Jimmy Heath, Bill Holman and more, and with singers Sarah Vaughan, Joe Williams and Aretha Franklin. Despite an unsuccessful kidney transplant in the early 1990s, Powell continued to perform and became heavily involved in jazz education, serving on the faculty of the New School for Jazz and the Performing Arts in Manhattan.
Benny Powell amassed a significant discography both within and outside of jazz, mostly as sideman. He recorded with Earth, Wind and Fire, Doctor John, Sammy Davis, Jr., Ray Charles and Ry Cooder, among others, in addition to such jazz artists as Duke Ellington, Buck Clayton, Frank Wess, Billie Holiday, Nat King Cole, Donald Byrd, J.J Johnson, David “Fathead” Newman, Oliver Nelson, Roland Kirk, Stanley Turrentine, Quincy Jones, Herbie Hancock, Joe Henderson, Ernie Wilkins, Les McCann, Frank Sinatra, and all artists mentioned earlier. As leader, he made too few recordings, including his last, Nextep (2008, Origin). Source: JazzPolice.com
FREE!
Monday, August 9, 2010 7:00 PM
Jazzmobile
100 Block Association of West 118th Street
W 118th Street and Lenox Avenue
New York, NY
Bill Saxton was born in Harlem and attended NYC public schools. His music career spans from the late 1960’s to the present. After graduating from The New England Conservatory of Music in Boston with a degree in jazz music, he went on to appear with and/or record with jazz giants, such as Roy Haynes, Jackie McLean, Clark Terry, Nancy Wilson, The Duke Ellington Orchestra, The Count Basie Orchestra, Frank Foster, Carmen McRae, Mongo Santa Maria, Roy Ayers, Barry Harris, Tito Puente, and Charles Tolliver, to name a few.
Saxton toured with the US State Department extensively in West Africa. He went on to play across Europe and into Japan and the Caribbean. The White House honored him during Black Music Month, The Harlem Jazz Museum featured his life and The Library of Music at New York’s Lincoln Center housed his induction as a Jazz Legend.
Tuesday August 3, 2010 7:00 PM
Jazzmobile
135th Street between 7th & 8th Avenues Host: 32nd Precinct
New York, NY
“Montague has a voice that is immediately appealing, and is adaptable to the variety of tunes that she has chosen for the album. Her sound is smooth with a soulful edge. She never gets tied up with vocal excesses, emphatic when she needs to be, and tender at the appropriate moments.”
—Joe Lang, Jersey Jazz
FREE!
Tuesday July 27, 2010 7:00 PM
Jazzmobile
Stuyvesant Cove Park
20th Street & FDR Drive
New York, NY
The Harlem Renaissance Orchestra carries on the big band tradition from the Golden Age of Jazz. You will certainly hear the play the classics by the greats – Duke Ellington, Count Basie.
FREE!
Saturday July 10 2:00 PM
Jazzmobile
Central Park West & W 106th
New York, NY 10025
Great Jazz on the Great Hill with performances by Jimmy Heath, Ray Mantilla, Briana Thomas, Dion Parson with Michael Varekamp.
A second performance featuring Boncella Lewis is being held at McDonough Street between Ralph & Patchen at 3:00 PM
FREE!
