Singer/Songwriter Tony Hightower is taking up the mantle to be a bridge that ushers R&B audiences into Jazz…Real Jazz. With years of experience as a musical performer and actor with familiar roots that place him firmly within the music’s firmament, Atlanta-native Hightower is still just getting started on this benevolent turn in his journey. And he is bringing a lot of young people with him.
Growing up in Atlanta with a local legend mother who was a Funk-Rock singer but could sing anything and mentored many singers coming behind her, Tony learned music first-hand from Bobby Blue Bland and the Platters to Mother’s Finest, S.O.S. Band and Brick. And as mother Theresa evolved as a first-class singer – shifting her focus to Jazz that resulted in her historic residency at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in once fiercely segregated Buckhead district of Atlanta, Georgia – so, too, did Tony’s taste begin to broaden. The artist that Theresa followed at The Ritz: Freddy Cole, Nat’s brother.
Trumpeter Terence Harper started playing the drums at the age of two and at twelve years old began playing the trumpet. While in middle school he began playing the drums for one of the Spelman College Jazz ensembles under the direction of Joe Jennings, while also being featured on a recording with the Inman Middle School jazz band on both trumpet and drums.
Harper attended North Atlanta High School Center of the Performing Arts and played trumpet in both jazz band and symphonic band under the direction of Mr. Reginald Colbert. During his high school years he started to focus more on both classical and jazz trumpet and has won numerous auditions during his high school term including the Georgia Music Educators Association All State band, principal trumpet for the district honor band, The Talent Development Program and the Atlanta Youth Wind Symphony at Emory University. Terence has also attended the prestigious Interlochen Arts camp in Michigan and has also taught trumpet performance and jazz studies at Summerbridge Atlanta at the Lovett School.
He graduated from Rutgers University as a classical trumpet major in 2009, where he studied under William Fielder, who has been regarded as one of the greatest trumpet instructors of his generation.
Every Thursday: Music from 8:00pm ~ Midnight | Hang til 2:00am
Cover: $10.000 | Musicians: $5.00 | Free parking in the lot just past slutty vegan atl