Results for "Original Jazz Compositions"

Joe Hertenstein

Born in Germany. In NY since Jan07. Freelance musician. Joe Hertenstein's recent performances include concerts at the Philharmony in Cologne, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, and the Moers Festival and XjazzFestival in Germany; the Congress Hall in Warsaw, Bush Hall London for BBC, the Opera House in Toronto, the World Trade Center in Dubai, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington DC, as well as Carnegie Hall, Dizzy's Club, Smalls, Roulette, Issue Project Room and The Stone in New York City. In 2005 "All About Jazz NY" magazine praised his performance observing that "Joe Hertenstein's drums seem to be shaping the music from the bottom up", and in 2011 “Hertenstein practices that loose time-keeping so prevalent in Europe that the ignorant use to claim that an entire continent can’t swing.” In November 2010 the Portuguese label Clean Feed Records released his remarkable debut album as a leader and composer “HNH” featuring Thomas Heberer (tp) and Pascal Niggenkemper (b). In 2009, the German government honored the further development of his trio "HNH" with a composition stipend to fund the recording of their next album "POLYLEMMA" which was released on the Canadian label Red Toucan in June 2011. For his artistic achievements, Mr. Hertenstein has received numerous awards and grants on both sides of the Atlantic. From 2007-2009, City University of New York, in cooperation with the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), granted him a full scholarship and tuition waiver to complete his Master of Arts degree in Jazz Studies at the City University of New York. Prior to his work in New York, Mr. Hertenstein studied music in Munich, Rotterdam, Berlin and Cologne. In Europe, he won multiple Jazz competitions, such as the Dutch Concours Ceramique Jazzcontest, and the German NRW-Jazzart-Prize. Mr. Hertenstein has received invitations to perform at a substantial number of festivals, such as the Hoeilaart Jazzfestival Brussels (Belgium), JekerJazz Maastricht (Netherlands), the Leverkusener Jazztage, Moers New Jazz Festival, Triennale 2007 (Germany), Portalegre Jazzfest (Portugal), Warsaw Jazz Summer (Poland) and many more. In 2009, he followed an invitation of the BBC to conduct a live performance with singer and Iranian dissenter Rana Farhan at Bush Hall in London. Mr. Hertenstein has performed and recorded with many international musicians such as Anthony Coleman, Kenny Werner, Chris Potter, Butch Morris, Juini Booth, Kenny Wollesen, Graham Haynes, Brandon Ross, Tristan Honsinger, Darius Jones, Jon Irabagon, Mat Maneri, Mossa Bildner, James Ilgenfitz, Sara Schoenbeck, Josh Sinton, Ken Filiano, Sean Conly, Todd Neufeld, Achim Tang, Thomas Lehn, Frank Gratkowski, Dieter Manderscheid, Matthias Schubert, Achim Kaufmann, Sebastian Gramss and Terrence Ngassa. He toured Europe in 2004 and 2005 with Canadian blues harp player Carlos del Junco. His work is released on labels such as MoersMusic, Cleanfeed, Red Toucan, 2nd Floor, jazzwerkstatt Berlin, Evil Rabbit, Chant, Springstoff, Ravello/PARMA, Meta, muworks, Konnex, Off, Fundacja Słuchaj, Leo and others. In addition to his performances, Mr. Hertenstein taught as a faculty member at the Offene Jazzhausschule Cologne from 2002-2007, he worked as a faculty member for drums and percussion at the Lycee Francais de New York, and the Trinity School in Manhattan and is a teaching artist for the Kupferberg Center of Queens College. For his album POLYLEMMA, Hertenstein won Belgian music critic Stef Gijssel's 'Happy New Ears Award' for most innovative listening experience of 2011. Joe Hertenstein’s project 'FUTURE DRONE' features German bassist and 'Improviser In Residence' in Moers 2011, Achim Tang, and the winner of the 2008 Thelonious Monk Competition, tenor saxophonist Jon Irabagon. The debut album of 'FUTURE DRONE' was released on jazzwerkstatt Berlin in June 2012. Hertenstein was a member of Butch Morris' NY ensembles Nublu Orchestra and LUCKY CHENG Orchestra. BBC broadcasted a short documentary on the band on November 13th 2011: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15715308 He performed with Adam Rudolph's GO:OrganicOrchestra and Karl Berger's Improviser's Orchestra.

Benjamin Schaefer

Benjamin Schaefer (*1981) is a jazz pianist/ composer based in Hamburg, Germany. He studied jazz piano and composition at Cologne conservatory and is a former member of the German Youth Jazz Orchestra (BuJazzO). Concert tours have led him to 26 countries on four continents. He has played hundreds of club and festival shows, many of them with his own bands Benjamin Schaefer Trio (2004-14), Expressway Sketches (2008-21), Quiet Fire (2014-19), Hive Mind (2017-19), Stone Flowers (2020- ) and solo (2022- ). He leads his own concert series open.fundus (2019- ) in Hamburg.

Jeff Lopez

born and raised in New York City, He has been playing bass for over 45 years and is an accomplished composer and arranger. 

Jeff is also an accomplished bandleader, composer, and arranger. This is evident on his first two CD releases, Sun And The Rain 1998 and Jeff Lopez-Jazz Composer, as well as numerous Jazz Ambassador recordings. Jeff’s compositions have appeared in various film and network TV productions.

Jeff’s professional career has included performing and touring that have taken him around the globe, including a 20-year tenure as the bass player of the U.S. Army Jazz Ambassadors, He has toured in 35 countries and all of 50 states in the USA. Some performance highlights were his two orchestral appearances at New York City’s legendary Carnegie Hall.

Cleveland Jazz Orchestra

The Cleveland Jazz Orchestra has been Northeast Ohio’s premier jazz voice since 1985. Led by award-winning composer and trombonist Paul Ferguson, the CJO promotes jazz in its historical and contemporary forms, through concerts featuring a stellar line-up of jazz luminaries, arrangers, composers, and educators. At a CJO concert, you will enjoy "the best jazz you've ever heard and the best jazz you've never heard." Through inventive, original music and effective, innovative Educational Outreach, the CJO shepherds young and up-and-coming musicians and provides our region with unique and important cultural experiences.

Our Mission

Rocío Giménez López

Born: December 4, 1983

ROCÍO GIMÉNEZ LÓPEZ (Argentina, 1983) is a pianist, composer and improviser, graduated from the Provincial School of Music of the city of Rosario. Later he focused on interpretation and improvisation within the language of jazz by attending piano lessons with Ernesto Jodos, Leo Genovese, Craig Taborn and Marilyn Crispell. He has also attended workshops and workshops given by Frank Calberg, John Stowell, Mark Helias, George Garzone, Benoit Delbecq and Kris Davis, among others. In 2015 he won a scholarship granted by the National Endowment for the Arts to participate in the III Third National Meeting of Composition and Improvisation, in Bariloche. In 2016 he founded the collective and festival of composers/improvisers CRUCES SONOROS, which brings together representatives of different musical genres promoting the development of activities related to original music and its meeting point with individual and collective improvisation. In 2017, she won a training scholarship, which gave her the opportunity to study with pianist Marilyn Crispell in Woodstock, USA. She was also invited to open Ravi Coltrane's concert in Rosario. In 2018 she was chosen as Revelation Musician for her album “Deseos Múltiples” in the national survey of journalists carried out by the Jazz magazine El Intruso. In 2019 he participates with his group of original compositions presenting the album at the Rosario Jazz Festival, at the Haroldo Conti Jazz Festival (BsAs) and at the Buenos Aires Jazz (Parque Centenario). He also toured Spain and France. In 2020 she is invited again to participate in Buenos Aires Jazz in a trio format (virtual concert at Usina del Arte). In 2021 he releases REUNION EN LA GRANJA (ICM records), an album that revisits the music of Ornette Coleman and Paul Motian, chosen by Dave Sumner as one of the twelve best albums of the year released on the BANDCAMP platform. The same year the FNA grants him a Creation scholarship that allows him to continue working on a composition project based on abstract photographs used as graphic scores (project in development). He currently works as a pianist and leader, in different musical projects within the cities of Rosario and Buenos Aires.

Hank Hensley

Hank Hensley is a writer and producer from Louisville, Kentucky who has composed original music compositions for the past 35 years. Hensley values the intrinsic worth of the stories told behind his music and the depth of the musicians who tell them.

Each of Hensley’s original tracks are created with the purpose of adding intrinsic value to be woven into the tapestry of our culture. Each work takes the listener on a journey, creating a transcendent connection to the music on a variety of levels.

Ryan Meagher

Born: August 18, 1981

As with all the best jazz musicians, guitarist Ryan Meagher (pronounced Marr) refuses to sit still. The Portland-based composer and player maintains a steady stream of activity, whether that’s teaching at various schools throughout the Northwest, performing regular gigs around his hometown, or writing thoughtful music that spans the vast spectrum of jazz music, from post-bop to Latin to avant-garde.

Meagher’s forward momentum was fomented early, during his teen years growing up in San Jose, California, where he split his time between taking baseball practice and working out his guitar chops in a series of youthful garage bands. From there, he began his most serious music studies, both in the classrooms and rehearsal halls of San Diego State University, and, starting in 2003, the clubs and venues of New York City. That combination of academic inquiry and the make-or-break proving ground of one of the country’s brightest artistic centers brought about Meagher’s thoughtful compositional style and a curiosity that has allowed him to move between musical worlds with ease.

Tobias M. Hoffmann

Tobias Hoffmann was born in Göppingen (Germany) in 1988 and discovered his passion for music and the saxophone during his high school years. 
From 2008 until 2010 he studied at the University for Music, Drama and Media in Hanover and from 2010 at the Prins Claus Conservatorium Groningen 
(The Netherlands), where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in June 2013. From 2013 until 2015 he studied Jazz Saxophone at the Musik und 
Kunst Universität Wien (Austria) and graduated with a Master of Arts (MA) with distinction. At the same time he studied Jazz Composition and 
Arrangement and graduated with distinction in 2018.

Dan Bosshardt

Vitor Pereira

Born: July 24, 1979

Vitor Pereira was in Porto (Portugal), where he started studying classical music graduating in classical guitar in 2003. Vitor Pereira was born in Porto/Portugal where he studied classical music and started developing an interest for jazz. He participated in several jazz seminars and private lessons in Europe with musicians such as Pat Metheny, Jonathan Kreisberg, Gilad Hekselman or Aaron Goldberg and in 2004 moved to London to study jazz performance at Middlesex University. Since then, living in London he’s been an active name in the local and European jazz scenes performing with Asaf Sirkis, Marc Demuth, Binker Golding, Andre Canniere, etc... With his quintet he published three albums of original music