Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Roy Anthony Hargrove was born October 16, 1969 in Waco, Texas to parents who discovered his musical abilities as a young child. He received trumpet lessons and was greatly influenced by David “Fathead” Newman when Ray Charles’ band played at his junior high school. By high school his jazz potential was discovered by Wynton Marsalis during a visit to Dallas’s Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts. He went on to spend a year at Berklee College of Music in Boston but was regularly found at jam sessions in New York and finally transferred to the New School there.

He first recorded with saxophonist Bobby Watson followed by the group “Superblue” with Watson, Mulgrew Miller and Kenny Washington. He released his first solo album “Diamond In The Rough” on Novus/RCA and followed with four more releases. In 1993 he was commissioned by the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra and composed “The Love Suite: In Mahogany”. Hargrove went on to record “Family” in 1995, and then, experimenting with other musicians, as part of a trio, the album Parker’s Mood, in 1995 with bassist Christian McBride and pianist Stephen Scott.

Roy has played with a host of stellar musicians including Shirley Horn, Joe Henderson, Stanley Turrentine, Johnny Griffin, Branford Marsalis, Joshua Redman, Herbie Hancock and Wynton Marsalis. He has stretched his limits performing and collaborating with D’Angelo, Common, Erykah Badu, Worldwide Underground and played on the film album Like Water For Chocolate.

Hargrove won two Grammy Awards, one being in 1998 for the album Habana with the Afro-Cuban band he founded, “Crisol”. He is also the leader of the progressive group “RH Factor” which combines elements of jazz, funk, hip-hop, soul and gospel and has also ventured into big band with his latest album “Emergence”. Trumpeter Roy Hargrove continues to compose, arrange, perform and tour until he passed away on November 2, 2018 in Mount Sinai Hospital, New York City.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Mark Whitfield was born October 6, 1966 in Syosset, New York and graduated from Boston’s Berklee College of Music, studying composition, arranging and all styles of guitar performance. Upon graduation he returned to New York embarking on a career that afforded him the opportunity to collaborate with many artists including Dizzy Gillespie, Art Blakey, Clark Terry, Jimmy Smith, Carmen McCrae, Herbie Hancock, Quincy Jones, Jack McDuff, Betty Carter, Shirley Horn, Ray Charles, Gladys Knight, Burt Bacharach, Joe Williams, Wynton Marsalis, Bradford Marsalis, Stanley Turrentine and his greatest teacher and mentor George Benson.

The New York Times dubbed Whitfield “The Best Young Guitarist in the Business” and in 1990 Warner Bros. released his debut, “The Marksman”. The success of this release has led to a recording career that has produced 14 projects as a leader and collaborations with Sting, D’Angelo, Mary J. Blige, Chaka Khan, John Mayer, Jill Scott, Roy Hargrove, Diana Krall, Lauryn Hill, Sy Smith and Chris Botti.

In 2005, Whitfield accepted the invitation to join the faculty at Berklee, teaming up with Joe Lovano, Ralph Peterson, Danilo Perez, and Terry Lynn Carrington as “Artists in Residence”. While maintaining a teaching schedule the guitarist performs, tours worldwide and records, his latest project being “Songs of Wonder”, with two projects in the works with Christian McBride and Nicholas Payton.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Robert L. Hurst III was born on October 4, 1964 in Detroit, Michigan and began his early music studies playing the guitar before concentrating on the bass. In 1985 he began working with Out Of The Blue and adding such jazz luminaries and contemporaries as Tony Williams, Mulgrew Miller, Harry Connick Jr., Geri Allen, Russell Malone, Terence Blanchard, Pharaoh Sanders, Sting, Carl Allen and Steve Coleman among others to his roster.

From 1986 to 1991 Hurst played in Wynton Marsalis’s ensemble, played with Branford Marsalis in the early nineties, and debuted as a leader in 1993 recording “Robert Hurst Presents” that reached #13 on the Billboard Top Jazz Albums chart. He has won four Emmy and five Grammy awards and directed, arranged and composed while a member of The Tonight Show Band.

He has scored original music for the films The Wood and Brown Sugar; performed music for Ocean’s 11, Ocean’s 12, Ocean’s 13, and on the Good Night, and Good Luck the soundtrack featuring Dianne Reeves, in which she won the Jazz Vocal Grammy in 2008. His recent recordings with Kenny Garrett and Diana Krall were each nominated for a 2007 Grammy.

No stranger to education Hurst has been involved with the Education of Jazz and Jazz History, receiving the Presidential Scholarship from President Ronald Reagan. He currently holds a position of Associate Professor teaching jazz bass at the University of Michigan’s School of Music, Theatre & Dance, and holds a seat with the Board of Directors for the John Coltrane Foundation.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Dave Kikoski was born on September 29, 1961 in New Brunswick, New Jersey and learned to play the piano from his father who started him out at age six. In his early teens he played with his father, jazz and rock bands, and won “The New Jersey Allstate Jazz Competition”. Graduating from high school he headed to Boston’s Berklee School of Music, had a stream of trio gig while matriculating, met Pat Metheny who sat in on a gig and later recorded with him along with Roy Haynes.

Mid 80s found Dave in New York performing and recording several different dates through the end of the decade with Roy Haynes, Randy Brecker, Bob Berg and Billy Hart. In 1989 he recorded “Presage”, his first date as a leader with Eddie Gomez and Al Foster. His sophomore project “Persistent Dreams” featured a larger ensemble with Randy Brecker and Billy Hart. Since the nineties he has been kept busy as a sideman, session player and leader working with the likes of John Patitucci, Jeff “Tain” Watts, Red Rodney, Craig Handy, Ralph Moore, Didier Lockwood, Joe Locke, the Mingus Big Band, Victor Lewis, Roy Hargrove, Dave Holland and others.

Pianist Dave Kikoski has recorded sixteen albums as a leader and four as a sideman and co-collaborator, toured worldwide, played prestigious festivals and continues to perform, record, compose and expand his own voice.

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Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Barbara Dennerlein was born on September 25, 1964 in Munich, Germany. The hard bop/post bop Hammond B3 organist began playing electric organ at age 11. After starting organ lessons, she learned to play the two-manual organ with a bass pedal board. After one and a half years of lessons she continued to study without formal instruction and by 15, she playing in a jazz club for the first time. When leading her own bands, she was often the youngest musician in the group, learning to cooperate with more experienced musicians. Her local reputation as the “Organ Tornado from Munich” spread after her first television appearance in 1982.

With her career jumpstarted Barbara recorded her first two albums and by her third “Bebab”, she started her own record label, receiving the German Jazz Critics Award. She signed with Enja Records for three recordings, moved to Verve’s international label for three more sessions working with Ray Anderson, Randy Brecker, Dennis Chambers, Roy Hargrove, Mitch Watkins, and Jeff “Tain” Watts.

Her performances include solo performances as well as quintets and she has worked on a variety of projects with the pipe organ, church organ and symphonic orchestras. She has recorded twenty-three albums to date and her compositions range from traditional blues, romantic melancholic ballads and up-tempo drives with elements of swing, bebop, funk and Latin rhythms. Barbara Dennerlein continues to compose, record, perform and tour.

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