Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Leah Souza was born in Plymouth, Massachusetts on May 8, 1982 and began singing at a very early age. She started performing at functions and outdoor concerts when she was thirteen. At 16, she was the lead vocalist of a seven piece band that was selected in a national talent search to perform in California. In high school she was the jazz band’s featured vocalist and played the tenor saxophone in multiple bands. She got her big break nationally singing on a song with her flugelhornist father, appropriately titled A Song for My Father.
Leah studied with jazz singer and vocal coach Rebecca Parris while in high school. For several years she regularly attended a Jazz All-Stars show at “Ricky T’s Jazz Club” on the South Shore. There she listened to the top jazz musicians in New England on a weekly basis and eventually began sitting in with the different All-Star bands. Studying these musicians helped her develop as a musician herself, as well as, the opportunity to meet and perform with many wonderful and often legendary performers.
She crafts her duo, trio, quartet or quintet to the venue she is playing with performances that may be lively and exciting, or romantic and full of standard ballads. Souza has performed at the cream-of-the- crop venues in Boston, Massachusetts and throughout New England.
Vocalist Leah Souza continues to pursue her burgeoning career as she expands her reach.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Matt Bauder was born and raised in Ann Arbor, Michigan on May 3, 1976 and attended the University of North Texas in Denton, Texas and earned a bachelor of fine arts in jazz and contemporary improvisation at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.
From 1999 to 2001 he lived in Chicago, Illinois where he was a part of the city’s modern jazz and improvised music scene. Matt attended graduate school at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut studying under Anthony Braxton and received a master’s degree in composition. He lived in Berlin, Germany for a year, then moved to New York City in 2005.
In 2003, Bauder released his debut album, Weary Already of the Way, on 482 Music. His sophomore album in 2007 was the first album from his long-form improvisational jazz trio Memorize the Sky, featuring Bauder on saxophone, clarinet, bass clarinet and percussion, Zach Wallace on bass, vibraphone and percussion, and Aaron Siegel on drums and percussion. The band released two more albums in 2008 and 2010.
His next trio, Hearing Things, had the saxophonist leading JP Schlegelmilch on organ and Vinnie Sperrazza on drums. Never limiting himself to one genre, Bauder’s next venture formed the doo-wop jazz group White Blue Yellow & Clouds, covering songs by the Beach Boys, The Flaminogos and The Mystics.
His Brooklyn-based jazz quintet Day in Pictures released two albums on Clean Feed Records, in which heplayed tenor saxophone and composed the songs on both albums. Matt has since performed as part of the Arcade Fire’s touring lineup, played saxophone and clarinet on Will Butler’s debut album Policy, and has played in the Broadway production of Fela!
Ever busy, saxophonist Matt Bauder continues to perform, compose and collaborate on numerous projects across genres.
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The Jazz Voyager
The Jazz Voyager is back in sunny Miami, Florida for a visit to the Koubek Center that sits on the campus of Miami Dade College. This historic landmark remains true to its pioneering heritage, the celebration of its multicultural community with workshops, art exhibitions, theater performances, literary readings, concerts and more.
This evening I will have the pleasure of hearing vocalist Leesa Richards, who has performed with Gerald Austin, Peabo Bryson, and Dionne Farris as well as toured worldwide with Whitney Houston. Also on the night’s ticket is trumpeter Jean Caze, who has worked with Herbie Hancock, Aretha Franklin, Mariah Carey, Al Jarreau, Roy Hargrove, Arturo Sandoval, and George Duke, to name a few. Both Leesa and Jean bring with them their own quartets.
The venue location is 2705 SW 3rd Street, 33135. For tickets and more information go to https://notoriousjazz.com/event/leesa-richards-quartet-jean-caze-quartet.
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Daily Dose Of Jazz…
Jacques Butler was born on April 29, 1909 in Washington, D.C. but didn’t pick up the trumpet until his late teens. He began playing professionally with Cliff Jackson and Horace Henderson in New York City, then joined Marion Hardy’s Alabamians in 1931 for a year.
Leading his own ensemble in New York and touring from 1934-1935, Jacques also made recordings with Willie Bryant before relocating to Europe in 1936, where the two performed together until 1939. During that period he played with Frank “Big Boy” Goudie as well as with his own bands. He would tour Scandinavia before WWII and in 1940 he became well known in the Norwegian jazz community, and while visiting Oslo he recorded one 78 rpm. Returning to New York City that same year he played and recorded with Mercer Ellington, Art Hodes, Mezz Mezzrow, and Bingie Madison.
After a brief stay in Toronto he moved back to Europe in 1950, remaining there until 1968 as a regular at the La Cigale club in Paris, France. He appeared in the 1961 Paul Newman/Sidney Poitier film Paris Blues. In the 1970s he came home to the States and was seen working often in New York City, as a sideman with Clyde Bernhardt among others, and in the studio.
Trumpeter and vocalist Jacques Butler, who was sometimes listed as Jack, died in 2003. The date of his death is unknown.
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TYRONE JACKSON
The name Tyrone Jackson is the quintessential jazz piano player. His boundless creativity coupled with harmonic mastery, utilizes the piano as a blank canvas. Jackson is nationally recognized and has traveled the world as a solo artist and sideman.
As a composer, Jackson has composed original music for Pulitizer Prize winning author Natasha Tretheway’s book of poems “Native Guard” turned theatrical play, Pearl Clege’s play, “Tell Me My Dream”, “Ethel” and this year’s Alliance Theater production of “Nick’s Flamingo Grill.” Jackson has recorded 4 Albums—“Dedicated”, “Another Voyage”, “Melody In Nede”, and new release “From The Mind Of.”
Lavahi is a scholar-artist on a mission to better society from the inside out. Through her music, scholarship, and performance, LAVAHI is building a platform to nourish the heart and mind, empathize our human experiences, and vibe together. As a daughter of jazz, the culture heavily informs her ideology and influences her sound. Acrobatic scatting, compelling chords, and the art of improvisation evoke that classic traditional aesthetic and set her contemporary sound apart from the norm of mainstream neo-soul, hip hop, and R&B. And with her satisfying blend of analog and digital sounds, LAVAHI shows that the lineage of Black sound is not linear but ever folding and stretching.
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