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ARTISTS/CLINICIANS
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Buddy Greco
has been recognized in the world of jazz as a
“singer’s singer” and a “musician’s
musician”. He has achieved international fame as one of the top jazz
pianists and vocalists of our time.
His career has spanned over fifty years
and his performances have taken him to some of
the leading nightclubs and concert halls around
the world.
One of Buddy’s crowning achievements
was his command performance for England’s
Queen Elizabeth II, which he shared with the
rock group “The Beatles”.
Buddy
began playing the piano at the age of four.
As a child radio personality and jazz
piano prodigy, he had established himself as a
veteran performer by the age of sixteen when he
was discovered by Benny Goodman and offered a
job as pianist with the famous Benny Goodman
Orchestra.
Buddy toured with Goodman for the next
four years.
Since then, Greco has gone on to develop
a highly successful career as a jazz pianist,
vocalist and songwriter.
His list of recordings covers a wide
range of styles and includes an impressive 65
albums and 100 singles.
Buddy received gold records for his
famous hits “The Lady Is A Tramp”, “Around
The World” and Oh Look At Her Ain’t She
Pretty?”.
In recent years he has settled in Las
Vegas where he performs to capacity crowds at
the Desert Inn Hotel.
On occasion Buddy will venture out on a
world tour and make special appearances at
venues like Carnegie Hall in New York City and
the Cafe Royal in London, England.
For more information about Buddy,
visit his website
at
www.buddy-greco.com
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Tenor and
soprano saxophonist Bob Berg is one of
the most notable post-Coltrane stylist playing
today. He was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., on April
, 1951. By
the age of 13, Berg was listening to jazz and
was performing in his school band.
A drop-out from The School for the
Performing Arts, he spent a year studying at
Juilliard School in a non-academic music
program.
Starting in 1966 and continuing for the
next three or four years his interest in
Coltrane’s later avant-garde work spurred
his immersion into the free-jazz scene of the
day.
A
strong reaction to playing more “outside’
music led Berg to go back to studying the more
classic 1950s formations led by Miles Davis
with Coltrane as well as Coltrane’s earlier
work. This led to work with organist Jack McDuff in 1969, where he
played in a more funky, Gene Ammons-inspired
style. Berg’s reaction to free-jazz was followed by a similar
aversion to the jazz-rock fusion of the 1970s.
Instead, he devoted himself to playing
strictly acoustic jazz in a bebop style.
In 1974-’76, he played with pianist
Horace Silver’s ban, followed by a period
with pianist Cedar Walton’s quartet
(1976-’81).
This work led to his being exposed to
the festival circuit, both in the United
States and internationally.
From
1981-’83, Berg lived and played in Europe,
returning to the U.S. in early 1984 to join
the Miles Davis band. He stayed with Davis until 1986.
His style of playing with Davis’
electric group was allowed to go beyond mere
vamps and fusion clichés, playing as he did
with a robust, well-articulated sound.
Since then, Berg has gone on to
collaborate and record under his own name.
Recordings
include:
Enter The Spirit (with Chick
Corea, Stretch, 1997), Riddles (Stretch, 1994), Virtual Reality (Denon, 1993), Back Roads (Denon,
1991), Cycles
(Denon, 1989)
and Short Stroies (Denon, 1987).
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Dr.
Gene Aitken,
former Director of Jazz Studies at the
University of Northern Colorado, is one of the
most active and energetic clinicians in Jazz
Education today. Under his direction, the UNC
Jazz Studies Program has received more Down
Beat magazine awards and more National Endowment for the Arts grants than
any institution of higher education in the
United States. Also, UNC is the only
institution of higher education in the United
States to ever receive a Grammy Nomination in
the Vocal Jazz area. During his tenure, Gene
produced 32 record albums and compact discs
and is currently under contract with Los
Angeles-based United Jazz Artists Records.
Gene
has authored over 30 articles for national and
international journals on jazz education and
computer technology, plus has had several
musical compositions published through Kendor
Music. In June 1997, the National Education
Association published the chapter, "Music
in the Twenty-first Century" by Aitken,
in their book on the future of education. He
has presented seminars and workshops at the
Mid-West Band and Orchestra Clinic, the
National Association of the Schools of Music,
the Society for Applied Learning Technology,
the National Education Association and others.
Further, he has presented numerous clinics and
workshops for American Choral Directors'
Association and the International Association
of Jazz Educators' Association. In addition to
conducting many clinics, workshops and
performances in the instrumental and vocal
jazz area, he presents seminars and workshops
promoting multimedia and music technology.
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Sam
Pilafian
is perhaps best known as a founding member of
the internationally renowned Empire Brass
Quintet.
He has also recorded and performed with
the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the New York
Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestra of St.
Luke’s, the Metropolitan Orchestra, the Duke
Ellington Orchestra, Lionel Hampton, and Pink
Floyd. As
a solo Jazz artist, Sam has recorded over ten
CDs. He
is also a member of the large brass ensemble
Summit Brass.
Recently, he became a member, arranger,
and recording producer of the Brass Band of
Battle Creek. Solo recital and concerto performances during the current
year have taken him to Canada, Spain, Sweden,
Switzerland, Japan, Italy, Austria, Germany,
and England.
In 1967, Sam won the Concert
Competition at the National Music Camp in
Interlochen, Michigan, becoming only the
second tubist in over fifty years to do so.
He subsequently won fellowships to
Dartmouth College and the Tanglewood Music
Center. While
at Tanglewood he was invited by Leonard
Bernstein to perform onstage in the world
premiere of Bernstein’s MASS, which opened
the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing
Arts. He
is currently Professor of Music and Director
of the Jazz Band at Arizona State University,
having previously served for twenty years on
the faculties of Boston University and their
summer Tanglewood Institute.
Sam has won the Walter Naumberg Chamber
Music Award, the Harvard Music Association
Prize, and the University of Miami’s
Distinguished Alumni Award.
A past President of T.U.B.A., an
international tuba/euphonium interests
organization, Sam now serves as Chairman of
its Board of Directors. The German tuba manufacturer Meinl-Weston has sponsored him
for thirty years.
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 Clipper Anderson is an alumnus of The University of Montana where he attended college as a music major in the late 70's. After college, he left to go to Spokane, Washington where he maintained a busy schedule as a professional jazz bassist. He worked steadily for many years at Ankeny’s on the top of the Ridpath Hotel while garnering most of the jazz bass work there was to be had in the city. Also during his tenure in Spokane, Clipper taught bass at Spokane Falls Community College and Eastern Washington University in Cheney.
Clipper currently resides in Seattle where he has spent the last several years building his reputation as on the of the finest jazz bass players in the Pacific Northwest. He was recently described in Seattle’s premier jazz magazine Earshot as being “a player for the connoisseur to savor”.
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A native Montanan, David Morgenroth is
a familiar face to Missoula audiences,
appearing regularly at the University of
Montana Jazz Festival as well as performing as
a guest with the Missoula Symphony Orchestra.
He recently moved back to Montana after
six years in New York City, where he studied
classical piano with Sophia Rosoff and jazz
with Fred Hersch and Richie Beirach.
He holds B.M. and B.A. degrees from
Arizona State University, where he was an
Arizona Board of Regents scholar, and M.M.
degrees in piano and jazz studies from the
University of North Texas, where he was a
teaching fellow and a member of the One
O’Clock Lab Band.
In 1998, Mr. Morgenroth released his
first jazz CD, entitled “Radiance”, which
features Chris Potter and Drew Gress.
Outside of music, he is president of
Western Financial, Inc. and vice-president of
Morgenroth Music Centers, Inc.
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Dr. Robert LedBetter is an Associate Professor of Music at The University of Montana where is he Director of Percussion Studies and Director of the “Big Sky Winds” Marching Band. He holds a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree in Percussion Performance from the University of North Texas, a Masters Degree in Percussion Performance from the University of Akron and a
B.M. in Music Education from Mars Hill College in North Carolina.
As a performer, Dr. LedBetter was the lead player and soloist with the Panhandlers, a professional steel drum band in Dallas. He currently performs with two similar ensembles in Missoula called the 4-tet Caribe and the UM Islanders. In addition, Robert is a free-lance drummer with local jazz groups like the Trout Quintet, the Ed Norton Big Band and the Chuck Florence Quartet.
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