Rogerio Boccato

Brazilian percussionist and educator Rogério Boccato plays in projects led by some of today’s leading jazz players, among them Maria Schneider, John Patitucci, Fred Hersch, Danilo Perez, Ben Allison, Kevin Hays, among many others. He has also collaborated with top-ranking Brazilian artists, such as Toninho Horta, Dori Caymmi, Moacir Santos, and Vinicius Cantuária.

He is featured on Grammy-award winning album “The Thompson Fields“, with the Maria Schneider Orchestra, and also on two Grammy-nominated ones: Kenny Garrett’s “Beyond The Wall” and John Patitucci‘s release “Remembrance“, alongside Joe Lovano and Brian Blade.

As a longtime member of the “Orquestra Jazz Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo”, Brazilian percussionist Rogério Boccato has played with Antonio Carlos Jobim, Hermeto Pascoal, Milton Nascimento, Egberto Gismonti, João Bosco, Joe Zawinul, among many others.

Rogério Boccato has been a faculty member of the Manhattan School of Music and of the Percussion department of The Hartt School (University of Hartford) teaching Brazilian Music and Ritmica.

Patricio Morales: La Tierra Canta

Read "La Tierra Canta" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci

by Richard J Salvucci
May 25, 2025

If it has been some time since you listened to Ralph Towner, like a few decades or so, it may not be immediately obvious what classical guitarist Patricio Morales is doing. It may not even be obvious that he is playing jazz, although, by Morales' own account, Towner was a mentor and huge influence when he first came to New York. Morales went on to study with Towner on the West Coast. He subsequently toured with him as well. Morales ...

Album Review

Bruna Black: Vã Revelação

Read "Vã Revelação" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci

by Richard J Salvucci
February 16, 2025

Bruna Black is yet another one of those performers who started as something other than a singer but got there as soon as she could. Supposedly, she was a semi-pro basketball player, although that is not easy to run down. She certainly is a singer and a good one. Her repertoire in this recording is all in Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese, and as melodious as anything to be found. When Astrud Gilberto came on to the scene in 1964, she did ...

Album Review

Christopher Zuar Orchestra: Exuberance

Read "Exuberance" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi

by Angelo Leonardi
December 30, 2024

È decisamente un periodo d'oro per l'orchestrazione jazz. Ai molti bandleader e arrangiatori emersi nel nuovo millennio, si aggiunge decisamente Christopher Zuar, che firma il secondo album confermando le doti espresse in Musings (Sunnyside), il debutto di otto anni fa. Con un diploma al New England Conservatory e un master alla Manhattan School of Music, Zuar aggiunge una spiccata fantasia nell'arricchire il modern mainstream orchestrale di nuove suggestioni. Questo progetto è stato concepito tra il 2017 e ...

Album Review

Christopher Zuar Orchestra: Exuberance

Read "Exuberance" reviewed by Jack Bowers

by Jack Bowers
December 23, 2024

Composer/arranger Christopher Zuar's second album, Exuberance, recounts in musical terms a twisting yet picturesque journey that began seven years earlier, in 2017, when Zuar first met his now-wife, the animator Anne Beal, at MacDowell, the famed artists' residency in New Hampshire. While the relationship “blooms" in winter, there are “moments between" and other inescapable detours until “certainty" erases any lingering doubts, “exuberance" carries the day and Zuar and Beal are united as one. Yes, the music is ...

Album Review

Renee Rosnes: Crossing Paths

Read "Crossing Paths" reviewed by Katchie Cartwright

by Katchie Cartwright
December 7, 2024

In the course of a career that began in the 1980s and continues to flourish, Renee Rosnes has developed an extraordinary sound, both as a composer and as a pianist, one that is readily recognizable whatever the context. With Crossing Paths, she taps into longstanding affinities and affection for Brazilian music, illuminating elements and flavors that distinguish her singular style, animating the band and the material with her arranging magic. She opens the curtain with “Frevo," grabbing the ...

Album Review

David Bixler: BEATitude

Read "BEATitude" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
May 21, 2024

Felicity finds its way into the heart and soul of David Bixler's music on BEATitude. Reconvening the quartet that drew wonder out of adversity on In The Face Of Chaos (Red Piano, 2019), this acclaimed alto saxophonist delivers eight numinous originals that speak to conviction and faith in moving form(s). “A Power Deferred," opening the proceedings, artfully deals in the divine, exhibiting strength through patience. Providence--encircling this entire affair, and making its initial presence felt in this ...

Album Review

Christopher Zuar Orchestra: Exuberance

Read "Exuberance" reviewed by Katchie Cartwright

by Katchie Cartwright
May 13, 2024

Exuberance is part of a “long-form tonal conversation" between composer Christopher Zuar and animator Anne Beal. Zuar, a Long Island New Yorker, describes the work as “a journey of personal growth," which began in 2017 when he and Beal met as fellows at the MacDowell Colony in the woods of New Hampshire. He explains that the album is a “collaborative project that charts the last seven years of our lives." “In Winter Blooms," the opening track, grew out ...

"Of course, that’s not to say that the teaming of Patitucci, Lovano and Blade doesn’t deliver on its promise. ... When it comes to regional flavoring, though, nothing proves tastier than the Boccato-augmented quartet performance of 'Messaien’s Gumbo'." - Mike Joyce - JazzTimes, Dec/09.