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Denin Koch

Award-winning guitarist Denin Koch is a recognized performer, composer and educator whose musical conception synthesizes jazz, classical and rock music traditions into one powerful and unique sound. He has performed with Arturo Sandoval, Pat Metheny, Wycliffe Gordon, Branford Marsalis, Dee Daniels, Ellis Marsalis, Lynn Ligamari and Ryan Keberle and has held memberships in the Eastman New Jazz Ensemble, Spokane Jazz Orchestra and the Bob Curnow Big Band. His mentors and teachers include Gary Versace, Bob Sneider, Steve Kovalcheck, Clay Jenkins, Brent Edstrom and Dan Keberle. Koch's style has been lauded for its deep commitment to the jazz tradition whilst exploring modern ideas. His primary influences include Kurt Rosenwinkel, Jim Hall, Pat Metheny, Grant Green, Wes Montgomery, Kenny Dorham, Jimmy Page, Radiohead, Shostakovich and Dexter Gordon. ​ ​​
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Koch's debut record, re: manhattan project will be released in 2020. The record is comprised of a ten-movement suite for narrator, viola and jazz quintet that retells the story of the Manhattan Project, the secret U.S. government program that produced the atomic bomb at the end of WWII. Due to the project's excellence, Koch has been awarded a grant by the Institute for Music Leadership at Eastman to produce the album. The work was premiered and recorded at Eastman in October 2019. He has also premiered two big band concert pieces from the suite, "B Reactor" and "Flowers for the Shadows" with the Eastman New Jazz Ensemble. ​​
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In November 2019, Koch's book, Kurt Rosenwinkel's Star of Jupiter was published and released worldwide by Mel Bay Publications. The book features Koch's transcriptions and analysis of Rosenwinkel's improvisations from the 2012 quartet record Star of Jupiter. The book was completed in collaboration and approval from Rosenwinkel himself. ​​
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In 2017, he was named an Outstanding Musician at the Elmhurst Jazz Festival. That same year, he won the MusicFest Northwest Young Artist competition, performed with the Spokane Symphony Orchestra, and won the 2017 Whitworth Concerto Competition as a composer for his piece "season's passing." ​​
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In 2020, Koch was awarded a full scholarship and stipend to pursue a doctorate in jazz performance at the nationally-renowned University of Northern Colorado. While completing Master of Music coursework at the Eastman School of Music, Koch was on the faculty of the Eastman Community Music School and a member of the Institute for Music Leadership's Arts Leadership Program. He also served as instructor of undergraduate jazz history and assistant in graduate jazz history.

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Album Review

Zach Rich: Solidarity

Read "Solidarity" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Solidarity consists for the most part of warm, gentle chamber jazz ably performed by Denver-based trombonist Zach Rich, his quintet, a four-piece string section and half a dozen invited guests. Besides playing elegant trombone, Rich, who teaches at Denver's Lamont School of Music, wrote and arranged all of the album's eight handsome songs. The strings are present on the first six numbers; the seventh, “What Is America Rated?," features Julian Carey's spoken word, while the last, “The ...

3
Take Five With...

Take Five with Denin Koch

Read "Take Five with Denin Koch" reviewed by AAJ Staff


Meet Denin Koch Hailed as possessing “pristine playing, meticulous composing" and “a very personal voice deserving of attention," guitarist and composer Denin Koch has synthesized his wide and varied influences into a unique approach to jazz improvisation. He has performed with Arturo Sandoval, Pat Metheny, Branford Marsalis, Ellis Marsalis, Wycliffe Gordon, Dee Daniels, Ryan Keberle, and the Spokane Symphony (as a soloist), published a book, graduated from the Eastman School of Music, and released an album of original music—all before ...

17
Album Review

Denin Koch: re: manhattan project

Read "re: manhattan project" reviewed by Friedrich Kunzmann


The conceptual scope of guitarist Denin Koch's debut recording could not be much more ambitious. With Re: Manhattan Project, the young Eastman School of Music graduate contemplates the impact nuclear inventions have had on the world and delivers a powerful ten-composition suite. Each piece is either inspired by an element of the infamous Manhattan Project story or his own experience growing up in Richland, Washington, only a few miles from the first large-scale nuclear reactor, known as the b reactor. ...

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Solidarity

OA2 Records
2024

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It Comes in Waves

Self Produced
2023

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Temporary Songs

Self Produced
2022

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re: manhattan project

Self Produced
2020

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Seraph

From: Solidarity
By Denin Koch

The Einstein-Szilard Letter

From: re: manhattan project
By Denin Koch

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