THE SHOWROOM SESSIONS: Streaming LIVE from Piedmont Piano Company
Erik Jekabson Quartet
Plays the Music of Charlie Parker
Bay Area trumpet player Erik Jekabson and his quartet play the music of one of the architects of Bebop, the hugely influential saxophonist and composer Charlie Parker. Joining Erik are pianist Keith Saunders, bassist John Wiitala and drummer Deszon Claiborne.
Watch the LIVE STREAM on youtube or facebook
Donations/tips accepted via Venmo: @erik-jekabson or paypal.me/erikjekabson
Erik Jekabson is a freelance trumpet player, composer, arranger and educator who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is equally busy playing and composing for different bands, leading his own groups, (the Erik Jekabson Sextet, the String-tet and the Electric Squeezebox Orchestra) teaching a wide variety of students and running the Young Musicians Program at the California Jazz Conservatory. He’s spent time on the road with Illinois Jacquet, John Mayer, Galactic, and the Howard Fishman Quartet, and has performed at such notable venues as the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Algonquin Room, the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, Madison Square Garden, the Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Late Night with David Letterman.
As an arranger and composer, he’s arranged for both vocalists (Madeleine Peyroux, Ani DiFranco, Jane Krakowski, Jackie Ryan, Kenny Washington, Madeline Eastman, Kellye Gray, Sandy Cressman, Raz Kennedy, Rachel Efron) and instrumental ensembles. (San Francisco Symphony, Utah Symphony, Stanford Jazz Orchestra, Realistic Orchestra, California State University East Bay Jazz Ensemble, SF Composers Orchestra and his own Electric Squeezebox Orchestra. erikjekabson.com
Keith Saunders is a jazz pianist, as well as a piano teacher. He's a transplanted New Yorker and Los Angeleno, and since 2010 has resided in Albany. During his twenty-six years in New York he worked with Richie Cole, Richie Vitale, (basically anyone named Richie) Hank Crawford, Mickey Roker, Ralph LaLama, Frank Wess, and Valery Ponamarev, among others. In 1991, he became the leader of The NY HardBop Quintet, a cooperative unit featuring Joe Magnarelli and Jerry Weldon. The band was together for eight years and during this span recorded four CDs for the TCB label.
John Wiitala has worked with some of the greatest names in jazz, including Joe Henderson, Junior Cook, Charlie Rouse, James Moody, Bud Shank, and Cecil Payne. He has toured with Richie Cole, Arturo Sandoval, Shorty Rogers, and Jessica Williams, and has played at jazz festivals around the world, including Monterey, North Sea, Montreux, Detroit, and JVC/Concord. His recording credits include work with Scott Hamilton, Jessica Williams, Mark Levine, as well as Anton Schwartz.
A native of the Bay Area, Deszon Claiborne began his musical career at the early age of ten. Virtually self taught in the beginning, he went on to study with world-renowned drummers such as Richard Peterson, Rick Quintinel (Chuck Brown school of Drumming), James Levi, Billy Cobham and Kenneth Nash , an experience which provided him with a strong foundation in jazz, rhythm & blues and world music. He has had the pleasure to perform or record with the following artists: Peter Apfelbaum, Don Cherry, Charles Brown, Angela Bofill, Les McCann, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Robin Ford, Boz Scaggs, Greg Howe, Henry Butler, Giovani Hildalgo, Kai Eckhardt, John Handy, Taj Mahal, Donald Harrison, Rodney Franklin, and many others.