Results for "vibraphone"

Chuck Redd

Chuck Redd is an internationally well-known performer on both drums and vibraphone. He began his career when he joined the Charlie Byrd Trio at the age of 21. He also became a member of the Great Guitars (Barney Kessel, Byrd, and Herb Ellis.) To his credit are 25 European tours and six tours of Japan, with the Barney Kessel Trio, Ken Peplowski and the Benny Goodman Tribute Orchestra, Terry Gibbs and Conte Candoli. Redd was featured vibraphonist with the Mel Torme All-Star Jazz Quintet from 1991 until 1996. While appearing in New York with Torme, Ira Gitler of Jazz Times said: "Redd's vibes were equally notable for vigor and melodiousness." He served as Artist-In-Residence at The Smithsonian Jazz Café in Washington, DC from 2004-2008

Michael Pinto

Vibraphonist and composer Michael Pinto brings a fresh and dynamic voice to the music world. Combining virtuosic skill and an untethered sense of adventure, Michael provides both innovation and tradition to his ensembles and those of which he is a guest. Michael grew up in Medford, New Jersey, where he began studying music in the fourth grade. He discovered his love of jazz during his sophomore year of high school, when he became obsessed with a cd of Vibraphonist Milt Jackson with the Modern Jazz Quartet. Around that time, Michael began his diligent studies to master the arts of music and jazz

Marc Wagnon

Born: October 26, 1956

Marc Wagnon grew up in Switzerland, where he studied classical percussion at the Geneva Conservatory. Marc moved to Boston, Massachusetts in 1981 to attend the Berklee School of Music, furthering his mallet technique and studying composition. He eventually settled in New York City, studying Latin American and West African rhythms. He joined a Brazilian percussion group and formed his own progressive jazz ensemble, Shadowlines. Marc id the founder of Buckyball Music

Marc's interest in merging new ideas with the musical influences he is exposed to in New York City is his incentive for working within its wealth of creativity. He has released three solo albums which include contributions from a succession of jazz luminaries, and was instrumental in creating the avant-rock band Dr. Nerve, which went on to record 7 albums. Throughout the mid-1980s to 1990s, Marc's style developed in both composition and free improvisation, mixing sound sampling and manipulated natural sounds in working with numerous musicians in the New York downtown scene. This led him to form the New York Improvisers Group, a 10-piece ensemble based on conducted improvisation.

Marc's interest in science grew out of a fascination with astronomy. Primarily self-taught, he also attended lectures and classes at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. He has built two telescopes, and is inspired by inventor, engineer and philosopher Buckminster Fuller.

In the 1990s, Marc co-founded the group Tunnels with world renown fretless bassist pioneer Percy Jones, releasing five critically acclaimed CDs from 1994 to 2006.

In the mid nineties Marc joined a reunion of the legendary English band Brand X and recorded the CD ‘Manifest Destiny’ with the group, which was released in 1997. 

In 2001 Marc paired with one of the world's most famous rhythm sections, Mike Clark and Paul Jackson (Herbie Hancock's Headhunters), to create “Conjunction”, an album rooted in traditional funk that takes the jazz-fusion style towards a new musical horizon.

With these ensembles Marc toured extensively in the U.S. Europe, Japan and Brazil.

In 1997, Marc founded Buckyball Music, Inc., a company based in New York City that is dedicated to building a community for musicians by offering teaching, performing, recording and video services.

His interest in electronics has led him to push the boundaries of live performance with the electronic vibraphone, a sampled-based, 'midi' electronic percussion instrument, where he is recognized as a pioneer of this instrument. In his previously released  “Earth is a Cruel Master”, Marc took on performing the lion's share of the instrumentation, mallets, drums and keyboards. Marc also produced and engineered several recordings for singer Sarah Pillow and drummer Mike Clark, among others.

As an educator, Marc has been teaching students of all ages for over 20 years. He ran several workshops on improvisation at the EJMA jazz school in Lausanne, Switzerland, and is the percussion and music technology teacher at The Filomen M. D'Agostino Greenberg Music School in New York City. He has done beta testing for the screen reader VoiceOver, which is part of the Mac OS system, and is very involved in making computers accessible to visually impaired musicians. Marc has published an eBook teaching method for group percussion classes, which does not involve any need for previous knowledge of music technique. This is based on group dynamics, and by starting with simple concepts by singing the various drum strokes and polyrhythms, which allows the group to attain a level of complexity that would normally demand longer preparation.

Mike Dillon

When jazz legends Lionel Hampton and Milt Jackson first introduced the vibes to the jazz idiom circa 1930, they could have never in their wildest dreams foreseen where Mike Dillon would take the concept 75 years later. Likewise, Dillon's heroes Black Sabbath, The Minutemen and Bad Brains would've been hard-pressed to envision a vibraphonist internalizing their punk ethos and conjuring his own rage-against-the-machine spirit through the mellifluous sounds of the vibraphone. Enter the man himself, Mike Dillon. None of these observations matter or ever will. Some would call a force of nature like his visionary

Levon

Born: October 11, 1978

Levon was born in Switzerland. He was raised there and learned the vibes at the age of 7. Then he flew to New York City to the great New School University where he learned some other percussion. Some great musicians such as Chico Freeman, Jimmy Scott or Loren Schoenberg hired him. He had the opportunity to play with Candido and Giovanni Hidalgo. Later Levon went to Western Africa to get in touch with traditional percussion. He now lives in Switzerland where he perfomed recently with his brother Gregoire Maret (harmonicist) and MARCUS MILLER. Apart from that he performs very often with a lot of different projects

Paul Heckel

Paul has been an active freelance vibraphonist in the New England jazz scene for over 30 years. He has had the opportunity to play with many world-renowned jazz artists including Dizzy Gillespie, Clark Terry, Joe Williams and Buddy DeFranco. He also plays with many well-known regional players such as John Hunter, Charlie Jennison, Nate Therrien and Tim Webb. He has a wide-ranging repertoire of jazz standards and other tunes that includes compositions by Chick Corea, Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, Milt Jackson, Keith Jarrett, Gary Burton, Horace Silver, Dave Brubeck, Radiohead and many others. Paul can draw on a network of musical collaborators to put together groups of different instrumentations (adding bass, drums, saxes and/or brass) and sizes (solo, duo, trio, quartet) to match the needs to many different types of performance venues

Lalo

Born: November 4

Vibist-composer Lalo’s self-titled debut from 2003 featured a compelling trio consisting of bassist Kermit Driscoll and drummer Todd Isler. Favorable reviews abounded: “Lalo has injected some rock vitality into the vibraphone,” proclaimed host Liane Hansen during a feature interview on NPR Weekend Edition Sunday. “Lalo’s music exists as a playground made of sound,” read a Jazz Times magazine feature on the vibraphonist. The Village Voice said, “If Lionel Hampton joined ‘80s King Crimson, he might’ve played vibraphone like Lalo.” With her first release, Lalo established herself as an artist of innovation and skill

Tom Beckham

Born: January 18, 1968

Leading his own groups plus The Tom Beckham Trio, Norville Trio, and his quartet SLICE, Tom Beckham has released three CD’s to date: “Suspicions” (Fresh Sound New Talent, 1999) “Center Songs” (Sunnyside, 2006), and “Rebound” (2008). In 2015 he released a duo album with guitarist Brad Shepik entitled "Flower Starter." He also performs on solo vibraphone and is a Vic Firth artist. As a versatile sideman in New York for more than 20 years, Beckham has toured with/performed and/or recorded with a diverse list of groups and musicians including Brad Shepik's "Across the Way" quartet, George Schuller’s Circle Wide, JC Sanford’s Jazz Orchestra, jazz guitarist Rale Micic, the Motown/Soul group The Soul Night Band, jazz vocalist Jaclyn Guillou; the swing-era ensembles of Lapis Luna, Flying Home, and Bliss Blood; Joseph C

James Westfall

Born: September 11, 1981

James Westfall is a multi-genre instrumentalist, composer, and arranger living and working in Nashville. He performs most regularly on keyboards, piano and mallet percussion. Though Westfall now performs, records, and composes in contemporary commercial music styles, his background is in jazz – where he spent fourteen years living and working in the lush music scene in New Orleans. While living in New Orleans he attended The University of New Orleans where he was able to perform and be mentored under Harold Battiste, Ellis Marsalis, and Steve Masakowski. One of James’ first honors in the jazz world was when he was invited to participate in the Kennedy Center’s Betty Carter Jazz Ahead program

Wolfgang Schlüter

Born: November 12, 1933

Originally trained as an orchestral timpanist and percussionist Schlüter, motivated by a concert by Lionel Hampton, changed to vibraphone in 1952. In 1953 Michael Naura inquired if Wolfgang likes to join in founding the "Michael Naura Quintet", which he did. The two went on to share the stage for half a century. Shortly before Wolfgang received an offer to take the post of first drummer in the Dublin Radio Orchestra, but because of that concert by Lionel Hampton he was infected by the "jazz-bacillus". The contract had been returned without a signature. A stroke of luck for the German musical world