Results for "Songwriter"

Zach Green

Born: October 14

https://linktr.ee/zmgreen

Zach “Z. M.” Green is a widely talented and versatile musician well-versed in an extensive variety of musical genres, ensembles, and realms of writing. Born in Columbus, Ohio to a family of hobbyist musicians, Zach knew at a young age that his love of music wouldn’t be limited to just a casual pastime; it would become a deep passion of constant writing and learning. After being surrounded by Barbershop vocal music, casually tinkering at the piano, and drumming on household objects, he took guitar lessons for five years, while simultaneously putting his interest in rhythm to use by playing percussion in elementary and middle school bands. It was in middle school where Zach became fascinated with recording and producing music, creating short covers of pop and classic rock songs at home. Around the same age, he gained experience as a performer playing guitar in a student-led bluegrass band, gigging across central Ohio.

Donna Kay

Born: May 9

Donna Kay spent her earliest years in front of the television, memorizing every commercial jingle during the Golden Age of TV Advertising. She began formal music studies at age 8, and has been playing something-or-other ever since. From piano, she moved to voice studies, picked up the bass in a post-punk grunge band, made beautiful sounds for Atlanta's Liar's Club, and played keyboards and sang back up for the Americana band Wonderful Johnson in a paradise called Naples, Florida.

In 2008, Donna Kay moved to Greenville, SC, where she met jazz bassist Shannon Hoover, who mentored her and helped her become a reputable jazz singer. Her collaboration with jazz and experimental percussionist Daniel Zongrone led her to an artist in residence in Berlin, Germany, in the summer of 2014. The duet, called Vibe Vox, performed stripped-down versions of their electronic soundscapes in Berlin and Prague. Not wanting to go back to The Great American Songbook, whose pages by this time had begun to fray, Donna Kay decided to start a Gypsy Jazz/Western Swing/Boogie Blues band. Kay called her new band The Carousers. Kay enlisted the musical direction of Monty Craig, who was then an adjunct Professor of Guitar Studies at Clemson University. Monty enlisted the original line-up and played with The Carousers for seven years. The band boasted some of the best players in the region, including German native Hans Wolff on violin, Robert Nance on upright bass, Kevin Korschgen on percussion, Reed Miller on guitar, Jorge Garcia and Adam Knight on guitar and even Mark Rapp on trumpet. The band recorded a CD (Possessed), and EP (Devil Water) and two singles. (Across the Alley From the Alamo and the original tune, Free and Easy (Monty Craig).

Dr. Joan Cartwright

Born: March 12

Amazing Musicwomen Ensemble Jazz Vocalist/Historian Joan Cartwright and her ensemble trace the origins of Jazz from the West Coast of Africa to the clubs of Harlem. This presentation highlights the life, times and tunes of America’s premiere Blues and Jazz Women from Bessie Smith to Betty Carter and beyond. Selections include compositions of Duke Ellington, Fats Waller, Billie Holiday, Cole Porter, Norman Mapp and Joan Cartwright. (1-2 hours)

Hannah Barstow

Born: June 20, 1994

Hannah Barstow (b. 1994) is a pianist, vocalist and composer in the Toronto music scene. As a performer, she is firmly rooted in the tradition of jazz, and is strongly influenced by the classic trios and quartets of Shirley Horn, Ahmad Jamal and Blossom Dearie. As a composer, her jazz, classical, pop, and Latin music influences come through. She composes and arranges for a range of ensemble sizes from trios to women's choirs and big bands. Hannah is a regular performer at the Rex Hotel Jazz & Blues Bar, both as a leader of her trio and sextet, and with the popular R&B band, Jenna Marie Sings R&B

Brad Allen

Singer-songwriters are rare in the world of jazz, and even more so when the songwriter is a drummer. “It’s clear to me how everything I’ve done in my life has lead me to where I am right now in my music career,” says Allen. “I spent several years writing songs in other genres including folk, pop, rock, country and alternative. Those experiences definitely influenced my jazz writing. I want to write catchy, fun, interesting tunes that people will remember – tunes that other artists might also want to perform.” “I grew up in a small town in Nebraska. Not exactly a hotbed of jazz

Sarah Baker

Born: September 17, 1949

Kenny Kirkwood

Kenny Kirkwood is a Juno award-winning Canadian musician who has toured internationally in a career spanning three decades. He has worked with Gord Downie, Kim Mitchell, Jacksoul, Kevin Breit, NOJO and Paul Reddick. Kenny has also opened for James Brown, Al Green and performed for Quincy Jones. Kenny spent his childhood in Zambia, experiencing traditional Bemba and Nyanja music, language and culture, and hearing local folk and pop groups and church choirs. These experiences deeply ingrained in him the value of the communal and spiritual aspects of music, song and dance in everyday life. Over the last decade Kenny has collaborated with Indigenous people on Turtle Island and worldwide in working towards reconciliation

Brian Woods

Born: September 5, 1980

Brian Woods is an African-American pianist, vocalist, producer, songwriter, actor, and author. Brian’s musical roots are based out of the gospel church in Akron, Ohio where he has performed for most of his life, but his musical accolades expand far beyond that. Serving as a radio DJ for 88.9 “The Edge,” he began to broaden his musical tastes. In college, he also ran security for the national entertainment acts that were brought in. It was there that Brian saw his future. On a fateful evening working detail for Blessed Union of Souls, Brian saw one man playing a piano and singing and watched as it transformed the entire atmosphere

Adrianne Duncan

Born: August 9

Pianist, singer, composer and songwriter Adrianne Duncan has been making music since the age of six. The daughter of renowned classical guitarist and Clark Atlanta University professor Charles Duncan (author of The Art of Classical Guitar Playing), she honed her classical piano skills through summers spent at Tanglewood and Brevard Music Centers, master classes with such luminaries as Leon Fleisher, Ruth Laredo, Murray Perahia and André Watts, and four years as the pianist for the Atlanta Symphony Youth Orchestra under the baton of Maestro Jere Flint. She attended Northwestern University on a music scholarship and is the winner of numerous piano competitions and scholarships.

Kristen Lee Sergeant

Born: September 11, 1984

Kristen Lee Sergeant is a singer, songwriter, and arranger who has “gone beyond music. She is a conceptual artist…” in the words of author and producer Kabir Seghal. After releasing two albums that both received the distinction of DownBeat Magazine Editor’s Pick, she now brings us “Falling” - her third studio album of largely original material and wholly original vision. In it, Kristen synthesizes her training as a vocalist (from opera to theater to jazz), abilities as a poet, instincts as a songwriter and dramatic sensibility as an arranger to creates a world for us to inhabit in sound through her vision and deft use of her extremely talented ensemble