Results for "Sydney"

Charlie Chech

Born: March, 2004

Sydney-based vocalist and musician Charlie Chech is a lover of jazz and crooning, honouring the likes of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Bobby Darin, Tony Bennett, Nat King Cole, Andy Williams, Elvis, Ella Fitzgerald, combined with the modern-day crooners in Michael Bublé, Harry Connick Jnr, Diana Krall and much more.

Charlie has held several sold-out shows at a variety of prestigious venues, including Sydney Jazz Club Foundry 616 and iconic Darlinghurst venue Claire’s Kitchen.

Charlie staged his third major headline show and concert at Hornsby RSL Club in May 2023 – as one of the youngest performers the club has featured in their own headline show ever, an extraordinary feat! He was joined on stage by the Clive Lendich Quintet, featuring some of Australia's top musicians.

Keyna Wilkins

Keyna Wilkins is a pioneering Australian/British composer-musician. She was one of three finalists for the Australian Art Music Awards for Individual Excellence in 2021 and 2018 (APRA/AMCOS).

As an innovative soloist her solo show explores stream-ofconsciousness improvisations alongside her composed pieces, often using loop pedal and visual projections and inspired by contemporary human rights issues, astronomical phenomena and philosophy.

She has collaborated with six detained refugees from their prison cells via zoom, victims of Australia's brutal mandatory refugee detention laws for nine years, on music, poetry and art collaborations.

Matthew Ottignon

Born: 1977

2022: The Year in Jazz

by Ken Franckling
December 29, 2022

Current events impacted the jazz world in significant ways throughout 2022. In its third year, the coronavirus pandemic continued to lurk in some settings, while others recovered in robust fashion. Russia's war on Ukraine was felt by musicians and triggered an outpouring of support for its victims. Initiatives to ensure greater equity in jazz advanced. The ...

Jeremy Rose

by Lawrence Peryer
December 10, 2022

Saxophonist-composer Jeremy Rose leads a multi-dimensional career spanning a dozen releases of original music with collaborative and solo projects across the world, including The Earshift Orchestra, Jeremy Rose Quartet, and The Vampires. Rose is also the founder and director of the Earshift Music record label and festival and has performed at festivals, venues, and concert halls ...

Amanda Suwondo

Originally from Yogyakarta, Indonesia, pianist Amanda Suwondo started learning keyboard at the age of five. She started learning classical music during high school, doing grades, and playing at church. She then took her career as a musician to the next level in 2010 when she moved to Sydney, Australia, studying diploma of contemporary music at C3 College, NSW. During her study, she started to go seeing gigs and got inspired to play jazz by a pianist Judy Bailey, later became her teacher. She started to get more involved in learning jazz by joining SIMA’s Women in Jazz in 2011, taught by Jess Green (through which she was awarded a mentorship by Sirens Big Band)

Roy Venkataraman

Jason Bruer

Jason Bruer is much, much more than a jazz saxophonist. He’s a bandleader, star soloist, composer, arranger, esteemed teacher – He’s the professional’s professional.
He brings the chops, knowledge, performance excitement and technique garnered over decades of hard-grinding international experience in every musical context.
He augments it with pure musical passion, perpetual enthusiasm and the exploratory outlook of someone who is totally in love with music, constantly refreshing the beauties of the past with the excitement of the contemporary.
Jason brings it ‘all’ to every gig, every solo and every musical interaction with nothing held back and no holds barred. He brings total commitment and ultimate professionalism to every performance in every genre of music he chooses to play.
As a sixteen year old, Jason Bruer had an opportunity that most other lads his age only dreamed of – he was able to live in London with his family whilst his father was studying there. Music had always been part of his life – he was a massive fan, but here in London he binged on it. Being able to see many of his favourite bands was incredible after living in Adelaide, where concerts by international artists were infrequent. It is here his love for the sax was born – through a friendship developed in London, he was introduced to jazz, most notably John Coltrane and Weather Report. A couple of years later, after returning to Australia, he realised this is what ignited his desire to take up the sax, and at the ripe old age of 18 that’s exactly what he did.
Prior to this, his only exposure with the sax was on some of the Pink Floyd albums, as well as King Crimson and The Rolling Stones – he was a huge fan of these bands. He had never really been exposed to it as a lead instrument until he heard John Coltrane and Weather Report, that exposure basically blew his mind, and brought to life a love affair that has continued for over forty years.
You will find that Jason’s tastes are broadchurch when it comes to music. Obviously being a saxophonist, jazz would be his favourite style of music. But from his youth, he has been inspired by the greats, such as Led Zeppelin, The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Yes, Genesis, Little Feat, Eric Clapton and more.
Back in Adelaide, after only playing the sax for 6 months, he was asked to join ‘Prog Jazz Rock’ band Cottage who developed a bit of a cult following due to their unique and adventurous music. In 1982, Jason commenced a Bachelor of Music at Adelaide University. His first quintet, ‘Small Hours’, supported international heavy weights Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard and also Johnny Griffin. Whilst at university, he was asked to join eight-piece band ‘Fat Time’, becoming a very popular band in a very short time indeed. It wasn’t long before they outgrew the Adelaide scene. Jason saw it was time to take a risk and follow his gut. He moved with the band to Sydney in 1984. ‘Fat Time’ went on to become one of Australia’s most popular live acts.
There were a slew of TV appearances, which included – The Ray Martin show, The Mike Walsh show and Hey Hey It’s Saturday; and they also became winners of the national talent show ‘Star Search’ in 1985. Fat Time went on to support the likes of Joe Cocker, Santana, KC and the Sunshine Band, and Joan Armatrading. During this time, Jason also freelanced with some of Australia’s biggest artists including The Models, The Dynamic Hepnotics, Eurogliders, Steve Kilby and Swanee, performing live and featuring on a number of their record albums.
Come 1988, and Jason knew it was time to take another risk, this time moving to London. Slowly, but surely, Bruer established himself in the highly competitive London music scene. In a near twenty year time period, he played as a session musician, working with some of the biggest names in the music business – Eric Clapton, Sting, Mick Hucknell, Mica Paris, BB King, Stevie Winwood, Madness, Paul Weller, All Saints, Bonnie Tyler, Van Morrison, Jools Holland and Lulu to name a few.
He formed acclaimed fusion outfit ‘Pond Life’ and was one of the composers. They went on to record ‘Spanking the Plankton’ in 1995 and toured around Finland and the UK. He co-led Smith & Bruer Band with Roy Ayers’ sideman, Tony Smith. The pair enjoyed success working London’s club scene with their brand of retro jazz funk. They recorded ‘Searching for a Cool Basement’ in 2001.
Jason went on to tour extensively around Britain, Europe and Scandinavia with several bands, making numerous TV appearances on ‘Top of the Pops’, ‘Later with Jools Holland’, Chris Evan’s show ‘Don’t Forget Your Toothbrush’, ‘TFI Friday’ and Richard Littlejohn’s chat show. His talents also spilled over into TV theme tunes and film scores; one notable soundtrack was the film ‘Four Weddings and a Funeral’.
He also appeared in ‘The Brand New Alexi Sayle Show’, playing a psycho in a sketch alongside ex Neighbours and The Flying Doctors star Peter O’Brien. Comedy was a new adventure, and he found himself taking up the opportunity of working with some of the great English comedians who were involved in music such as Neil Innes & The Ruttles, Barry Cryer, Steve Coogan, Bill Bailey, Eddie Izzard and was a member of soul funk band ‘Ronnie & The Rex who were fronted by ex ‘Fabulous Poodles’ front man / comedian Ronnie Golden.
In 2006, Jason took another risk, moving his family back to Sydney. This was a step into a completely different scene than the Sydney that he left in 1988. But again, he followed his gut, and moved nonetheless. Within a few weeks of returning to Sydney, he was touring Australia as part of the Good Vibrations Festival with English band ‘The Cuban Brothers’, supporting James Brown. In the same year he was part of the house band for Simon Burke’s chat show ‘Studio A’. He also started lecturing and teaching at AIM (Australian Institute of Music), mentoring and guiding Sydney’s newest generation of musicians. In 2008 he released his debut (Solo) CD, ‘As Above So Below’ on Vorticity Music to critical acclaim.
In 2010, Jason formed sextet Hammerhead, then went on to record their debut album ‘Mozaic’ in 2014. You will have seen them appearing at numerous festivals including Wangaratta Jazz & Blues Festival, Thredbo Jazz Festival, Manly Jazz
Festival, Capitol Jazz Festival, Sydney Con International Jazz Festival, and Marrickville Festival. They have also performed sell out shows in Canberra at Gods Cafe, Street Theatre, and at the ANU as well as at The Wollongong Conservatoire of Music. You will find them playing monthly at one of Sydney’s most popular venues – Lazybones in Marrickville.
In 2019, followers and fans will have seen a change in direction for Hammerhead – hence the name of their new released album – ‘Turning Point’. Not only did their music take a turn, so did the line-up. Jason selected what he sees as the right musical match to give full bloom to his original compositions. Here is where you truly enter the world of Jason Bruer. Here he goes deep, injecting a broader compositional palette and a diversity of styles and disparate influences.
Currently, in addition to managing his own projects (Hammerhead, Soul Roots Revival Band, JB3), Jason teaches privately, and freelances regularly. He features in a number of other bands including ‘Dancing in the Shadows of Motown’, ‘The Aretha Franklin Songbook’, ‘Meme Wars’ and ‘The Locals’.
Over the course of four decades, Jason has experienced many memorable moments and experiences playing music. At the top of the pile would have to be the pleasure of playing at Stings’ 10th Wedding Anniversary, at his house jamming with him, Eric Clapton, Stevie Winwood, Michael Waldon, and The Jools Holland Band (he was a member of his band throughout a lot of the 90s) whilst the likes of Tom Hanks and Dustin Hoffman danced the night away right in from of him. He also played at the G8 conference in 1998 to all the world leaders including Bill Clinton with whom he met afterwards and chatted to. Playing before ‘The Who’ in Hyde Park (London) to more than 120,000 people was also a highlight, but Bruer says playing his own music, with a his own band in front of a great audience however big or small is still what gives him the most pleasure.

Max Petersen

Born in Sydney, Australia in 1994, Max began playing piano at the age of three, learning with the Suzuki method. When the Petersen family moved to Germany in 1998 he began taking regular piano lessons. At the age of 13 Max started playing in his first band with local musicians from Konstanz, Germany. This was when he began to practice more intensively and started composing original music for the group. At the age of 15, Max joined a special high school program in Kreuzlingen, Switzerland through which he started to take piano lessons at the conservatory in Zurich with Chris Wiesendanger. With only 17 years, Max was enrolled at the conservatory in Zurich, studying Jazz. In summer 2013 his high school’s classical orchestra performed Max' composition for orchestra entitled "Fantasie". In 2013/2014 Max studied at Manhattan School of Music in New York at the age of 19, attending the studio of Vijay Iyer, Jim Mcneely, Phil Markowitz and Donny Mccaslin. Max released three Albums as a Bandleader

Steve Arié

Born: August 20, 1964

Sydney based jazz musician Steve Arié is a rare bird on the jazz scene. After more than 25 years as one of the most in demand jazz double bass players, he has reinvented himself as a quirky vocalist and alto saxophonist with more than a nod to the styles of Chet Baker and Paul Desmond. Steve has performed with many Australian greats including Dale Barlow, Bernie McGann, D.I.G., Ten Part Invention, George Washingmachine, Pardon Me Boys, MARA!, Bob Bertles, Erol Buddle, Wanderlust, Martin Plaza and Gyan. He has played at prestigious festivals and events including two performances at Chicago Jazz Festival, Hothouse Jazz Club Chicago, The Kennedy Centre for Performing Arts (USA), Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Ruhrfestspiele Germany, Queenstown Jazz Festival and jazz and music festivals throughout Australia. Steve is self taught and plays saxophone, flute, double bass, electric bass, guittaron (Mexican bass), guitar and piano.