Anton Kot

Twenty-one-year-old drummer, pianist, gamelanist, and composer, Anton Kot, captivates
audiences with his multifaceted sound. Described as a musician with “composers wit”
(Paul Rauch, All About Jazz), he is known for performing original works that combine
elements of contemporary genres with the jazz idiom.

Born in New York City, Anton grew up with parents who are visual artists and was
surrounded by the creatives residing in Williamsburg during the early years of his life.
His parents started him on his first drum set when he was just three, and piano lessons
when he was four. At the time, he composed a piano piece titled Snowstorm after
watching the composer Philip Glass perform at the nearby venue, Roulette. Anton finds
that his early exposure to the arts widened his musical pallet as a child.

He has recently headlined at the 2022 Litchfield Jazz Festival and 2023 Pittsfield City
Jazz Festival. His acts included saxophonist Don Braden, Albert Rivera, bassist Avery
Sharpe, trumpeter Jean Caze, pianist Caili O’Doherty, and Tyler Bullock II. The
performance comprised original and derivative works that featured Anton on drums and
piano. Receiving a standing ovation, festival Founder, Vita Muir exclaimed in A Triumph
at 27!, “One audience member called Anton ‘a highlight in the Festival’s history.’ Praise
well deserved.”

In 2022, he premiered his twenty-five minute piano concerto, Let’s Try This, at the 2022
International Festival of Arts and Ideas with the New Haven Symphony Orchestra
(NHSO) directed by Alasdair Neale. The NHSO commissioned Anton before the
pandemic, prompting the piece to develop into a depiction of various phases of the
Covid outbreak as it entered social awareness in 2020. Let’s Try This is a self-reflection
where a pianist rediscovers their instrument under the stress of induced isolation. It was
designed to be performed differently each time as a nod to the insistent volatility of
Covid’s effect on daily life.

Anton has performed at venues domestically and internationally, including Dizzy’s Club
Coca Cola, Mezzrow, The Django, Le Duc des Lombards (Paris), Sunset/Sunside
(Paris), Dirty Dog Jazz Cafe, Jazz at Lincoln Center Shanghai, Carnegie Hall, the
National Centre for the Performing Arts (Beijing), the International Gamelan Festival
(Solo, Indonesia), Detroit Jazz Festival, Vail Jazz Festival, and the Newport Jazz
Festival. He is currently a student at New York University with Steinhardt, Music and

Global Scholar Merit Awards. He has performed, recorded, or collaborated with Sean
Jones, Kurt Elling, Wycliffe Gordon, Marcus Miller, Ken Peplowski, Ted Rosenthal, Steven Feifke, Cy Leo, Chico Freeman, Janis Siegel, Manuel Valera, Dezron Douglas, Ari Hoenig, Alan Broadbent, Tatum Greenblatt,
Pak Sumarsam, and I.M. Harjito.