To hear the fully produced piece, including samples of the music referred to in the text below, hit the play button above.
Ed Bride is president and founder of Berkshires Jazz. He says this weekend’s 10-fold world premiere – part of Pittsfield’s 10x10 Upstreet Arts Festival – is the most ambitious undertaking for the organization since it launched in 2005.
“We found 10 regional artists – and it wasn't hard to find 10 great artists in this area, by the way, who compose original work – and we made them an offer, said let's do this all at once as part of the 10x10 festival," Bride told WAMC. "So that's what we'll have on Saturday night. 10 different compositions, all making the world premiere at the Berkshire Museum. And so, the group has never assembled before. The rhythm section had a rehearsal to go through some of the more difficult pieces, but it'll be the first time any of these pieces are played.”
Bride gave WAMC an overview of some of the artists participating in the Jazz Composers Showcase.
“Mary Ann McSweeney is a first chair bassist," he said. "She's based in both New York and in Becket, she has a residence in Becket, and right now in fact, she's in the pit band for 'Some Like It Hot' on Broadway. So, she's taking a night off of her Broadway gig, right, to play in this showcase on Saturday, this composer showcase. Her piece is called 'Happy Birthday Mingus.' It's a birthday treat to Charles Mingus, the jazz bass player whose 100th birthday is this year, so she's doing an ode to Charles Mingus as part of her participation in the showcase.”
Here’s some of McSweeney’s “New World Fado” from her 2017 album “Urban Fado.”
Another composer is Jason Ennis.
“Jason is one of those chameleon guitarists in the best sense of the word," said Bride. "He can play any style, jazz, he does a lot of Latin and third world music. And he composes, he arranges, he plays standards, and he teaches at Dartmouth. I mean, he does everything. He teaches at the Berkshire Music School locally as well. And he's a go-to guitar player for other people as well as leading his own group. And so, he's composed a piece that I can't pronounce in honor of his son, Nico.”
Here's a taste of Ennis’s “The Juggler's Etude” from his 2022 release “Jota Sete.”
“Eugene Uman is the director of the Vermont jazz Center, which is one of the finest jazz education venues in all of America up in Brattleboro, Vermont," continued Bride. "He has composed 120 pieces of his own, he plays in the Vermont Jazz Orchestra, he has played here in the Berkshires many times, sometimes for Berkshires Jazz, sometimes for other people. He's played at Mission, and he's just a monster jazz piano player.”
Here’s “The Message” off of 2014’s “Six Elements” by Eugene Uman’s Convergence Project.
Bride says the event is all about the rich variety of jazz in the Berkshires.
“We have a panoply of ethnicity, of race, of gender," he said. "We have a 20-year-old jazz prodigy, Anton Kot, who played here as a jazz prodigy a couple of years ago. He has since gone on to college and he headlined the Litchfield Jazz Festival last summer at the age of 20. We have Richard Stanmeyer, another prodigy who’s in his early 20s. We have Kris Allen, who heads the jazz program at Williams College, and Eugene Uman, who runs the Vermont Jazz Center. So, people of every age, ethnicity, and jazz styles, and it's just a wonderful assortment. It's like a stew, you know, a lot of little different tastes, and put together, and what do you have, a cohesive whole. And I think that people will walk out of there saying, well, they'll have their eyebrows raised, and say, holy cow, what a what a rich talent area we have here in the Berkshires.”
