LVanHart Artist Productions and Stella May Productions
Present
Jazz @ Stella May Gallery Theatre
Tuesday, April 12th 2011
The Kevin Hays Trio
Kevin Hays, Keyboard ~ Doug Weiss, Bass ~ Ben Perowsky, Drums
Meet the Artists at 8pm ~ Music at 8:30pm
Music for ALL Ages!
101 Greenkill Avenue, Kingston, NY 12401
For Reservations: 845-331-7955
Tickts: $15/$8 with Student ID
www.lvanhart.com/news.php
On Tuesday, April 12th LVanHart Artist Productions and Stella May Productions Present Jazz with pianist/keyboardist Kevin Hays and his trio. The festivities begin with a Meet The Artist at 8pm. This is the time that the audience will get to ask questions of these musicians who are happy to share their insights and experiences with America’s Classical music – jazz.
Hays, an award winning jazz pianist will perform selections from his latest recordings ‘You’ve Got A Friend’ and ‘Live at Smalls’ which features music by such diverse artists as Charlie Parker, Bob Dorough, Paul Hindemith, and Lennon and McCartney. He will also include in the program several new original works by Hays including ‘Elegia’ from a newly recorded CD with pianist Brad Mehldau. The duo recently premiered this piece along with other material from their upcoming release at Carnegie Hall.
Kevin has had a long musical relationship with bassist Doug Weiss (a longtime member of Kevin’s Trio) and drummer Ben Perowsky, who has worked with Kevin over the years in his trio and in other groups, playing together with artists such as Chris Potter, Adam Rogers and others.
Jazz Pianist and composer Kevin Hays has now recorded over a dozen CD’s as a leader and has been featured on many recordings as a sideman. His recordings have been listed as among the ‘Top 40 Jazz Releases of the Year’ by Musician Magazine and praised by The New York Times. In the mid-nineties he began recording for Blue Note records and made several critically acclaimed CD’s for that label.
Over the past 15 years, Kevin has performed widely with his trio that includes bassist Doug Weiss and drummer Bill Stewart. The trio’s first CD in 2001, ‘What Survives’ (recently re-issued on Hays’s own NDS Records) included arrestingly beautiful arrangements of classical works by Johannes Brahms, Robert Schumann and Anton Webern along with his own compositions.
In addition to recording and touring with the trio, Kevin has long been considered ‘first call’ by some of the most prominent and influential musicians in Jazz. These include Sonny Rollins, John Scofield, Benny Golson, Roy Haynes, Chris Potter, Al Foster, Joe Henderson and Joshua Redman.
After a 4-year hiatus from recording during which time he moved to the high desert of New Mexico, Kevin returned to NY and to the studio. The resulting 2006 recording ‘For Heaven’s Sake’, devoted entirely to The American Songbook, received widespread acclaim including being awarded the French ‘Coups de Coeur’ Prize and ‘Best of the Year’ by The New Yorker Magazine.
On his latest trio recording ‘You’ve Got A Friend’ (2009), Kevin brilliantly reworks both Jazz and Folk classics of Carole King, Paul McCartney, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, Bob Dorough and others.
He has recently recorded a new Solo CD for the German label Pirouet that is scheduled for release in the fall of 2011.
Raised in Chicago, Illinois, Doug Weiss has lived and performed in the New York City jazz scene since graduating from the William Paterson College jazz studies program in1988.
In 1995 he recorded the first of two critically acclaimed Blue Note records under the leadership of pianist Kevin Hays. His relationship with Kevin, both intuitive and visceral, continues to the present with 10 cds recorded and many appearances in the United States and abroad. In 1996 began Doug Weiss’ association with legendary drummer Al Foster. Al’s band has toured the world, playing more than 1000 concerts and recording 2 cds to date. Their performances have been reviewed favorably by DownBeat, Jazz Times, and the New York Times.
In addition to these bands he performs with guitarist Peter Bernstien’s “Monk” project, with long-time friend and section mate Bill Stewart. Recently, Weiss was featured, along with Billy Drummond and John Scofield, on Eddie Henderson’s release “For All We Know” on furthermore records.
He has played the Village Vanguard and toured Europe with Brian Blade and the Fellowship band. In 2010 he began working with pianist Marc Copland, touring Europe in trio format and with the collective band “Contact”. He is also member of the band “Wayfarer”, a collective featuring Timothy Hill, Jeff Haynes, and Brandon Ross.
He continues to circulate in the New York club scene, with regular appearances at Smalls, Smoke, the Kitano and the Vanguard with the likes of Mike Moreno, Sam Yahel, Bruce Barth, Gerald Clayton, Chris Potter, and Jim Snidero. Doug Weiss has also accompanied such notable figures as Joe Williams, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Lee Konitz, Jacky Terrasson, Eddie Henderson, Lew Tabakin, Walt Weiskopf, the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, and Joshua Redman. He recorded 11 tracks on Lizz Wrights’ critically acclaimed debut album “Salt”, (2003) and toured extensively in support of that project.
Weiss currently resides in the Hudson River Valley, and is engaged in creating a new work by folk legend Pete Seeger, which is being produced by percussionist Jeff Haynes.
One of the most accomplished drummers of his generation, Ben Perowsky’s notable career has placed him among a small vanguard of players able to move between jazz, experimental music and cutting edge pop and rock. Ben began his early performing life with jazz legends Dizzy Gillespie, James Moody, pop songstress Rickie Lee Jones and R&B star Roy Ayers. He went on to tour and record with Miles Davis’ collaborators The Gil Evans Orchestra, Bob Berg, Mike Stern and later John Scofield. Ben has worked closely with numerous artists since then including Elysian Fields, Joan as Policewoman, Uri Caine, Steven Bernstein, Wood Brothers, John Zorn, Ronnie Cuber, Michael Brecker, Don Byron, Dave Douglas, Walter Becker and John Lurie’s Lounge Lizards.
Amidst his busy sideman/recording career, Ben created and co-led the band Lost Tribe who released three critically acclaimed records released in 1992, 1994 and 1998. He released Ben Perowsky Trio in 1999 from which the title Segment was used in the Will Farrel movie “Talladega Nights”. In 2003 he released Camp Songs for John Zorn’s Tzadik label, which was voted in JAZZTIMES TOP 50 Cds of 2003. In 2006 Ben created his own label, El Destructo Records with two releases to date: El Destructo: Volume I, a blending of dark ambient dub improv and then released through Sony/Red distribution September, 2009 “Moodswing Orchestra” which expands on this idea, adding 4 more instrumentalists and 5 well-known vocalists. Ben also formed the band RedCred with Chris Speed, John Medeski and Larry Grenadier. They meet regularly in the Catskill mountains to play concerts. In 2007 Ben played on the disco hit song “Blind” by Hercules and Love Affair. In August 2009 The Ben Perowsky Quartet: with Chris Speed, Ted Reichman and Drew Gress released a CD entitled Esopus Opus featuring Ben’s latest compositions and arrangements for Speed’s label, Skirl records.
In 2010 Ben appeared on the Grammy award winning CD Loudon Wainwright III “High Wide & Handsome – The Charlie Poole Project. He also performed at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver with Lou Reed, James Blood Ulmer, Elvis Costello, and recorded for French pop star Sioban Wilson as well as the solo ep from Indie rocker’s “ The Honorary Title, Jarrod Gorbell.