Live Jazz in SF Bay

A masterful vocalist and “the superman of the Bay Area jazz scene” ( SF Chronicl e), Kenny Washington is easily among the most beloved and soulful singers working today. A native of New Orleans, Kenny grew up singing gospel music in church and playing saxophone in the school band. He continued his music studies at Xavier University where he became interested in various styles ranging from traditional and contemporary jazz, to classical, to rhythm-and-blues and pop. Joining the U.S. Navy Band in 1986, Kenny performed and toured nationally and internationally through out the U.S., Asia, Russia, and Australia. After nine years in the Navy, Kenny made his home in the San Francisco Bay Area where he established himself as a top vocalist. While performing with the Michael O’Neill Quintet at the Douglas Beach House, Kenny met vibraphonist Joe Locke who happened to be in the audience. This led to an invitation to perform with Joe at Dizzy’s; Jazz at Lincoln Center (JALC). Since then he has been a featured artist at JALC for over ten years where he has appeared with Joe Locke, Eric Reed, Eric Alexander, Joe Lavano, Branford Marsalis, Roberta Gambarini and Wynton Marsalis. With Wynton, Kenny has performed both in small groups and large including numerous times with the "Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra.” In 2013 Kenny was featured in Wynton’s oratorio: "Blood On The Fields" which also included vocalist Gregory Porter. Kenny has headlined performances in Japan, Russia, Scotland, Shanghai, Denmark, Mongolia and many other countries. He has performed at top Jazz Festival including the Monterey Jazz Festival, Mid-Atlantic Jazz Festival and the San Jose Jazz Festival. Kenny is a jazz vocalist virtuoso. Emulating the classic styles of Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan and infusing colors of Stevie Wonder and Donny Hathaway, Kenny's free, playful approach, with over a four-octave range is awe inspiring. His tone on ballads is liquid and his scat singing - informed by his saxophone playing - is rapid-fire, passionate, melodious and inventive. His intonation is so precise that it becomes noticeable if the piano wasn’t tuned that day. Kenny is considered by many to be the premiere male vocalist on the planet today. This man is a must-see. Tickets at Kenny Washington Quartet

Gabriel Schillinger-Hyman is a Steinway & Sons Teacher and Educational Partner and 2X performer & arranger at Carnegie Hall, Gabriel is known for showcasing a catalogue of originals and arrangements of works by Bill Evans, Chick Corea, Thelonious Monk, Duke Ellington and more, and honors the history of these master pianists with performances that are both soulful and hard-hitting. Gabriel can be found touring and/or performing in NYC with internationally renowned jazz artists including CHRISTOPHER MCBRIDE (GRAMMY-winner), LUCAS PINO (Artistic Director at Brubeck Jazz Summit), TIM GREEN (sax for Michael Bublé and GRAMMY nominee), TYREEK MCDOLE (Sarah Vaughan Competition 1st place), APRIL VARNER (Ella Fitzgerald Competition 1st place), ERENA TERAKUBO (Kenny Barron Quartet, Jon Faddis All-Star Big Band...etc), Ben Solomon (Chick Corea, Wallace Roney, Aaron Parks), Emmanuel Michael (Aaron Parks, Ambrose Akinmusire) and more. Gabriel performs at jazz venues around the U.S. and is grateful to have music take him across the world, as far as Norway and Iceland. He has been honored to have performe d at the French and Czech Consulates in NYC, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum in New York. Gabriel has established himself as a significant force in education and is recognized for combining jazz performance with storytelling, touring multiple multimedia projects including "Invisible Jazz Giants," "Jazz on the Silver Screen," and "The Topography of Jazz: Revolutions in Sound Up, Down, and Around NYC" across the country Tawanda Suessbrich-Joaquim is an award-winning jazz vocalist based in Los Angeles, proudly a first-generation American with a mother from Germany and a father from Mozambique, whose artistry reflects a vibrant mix of cultural heritages. Her rapid ascent on the international stage is marked by major honors and extensive global touring, including winning the 2021 Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition—an accolade previously conferred on artists such as Cyrille Aimée, Jazzmeia Horn, and Samara Joy. In April 2023, she received an Outstanding Achievement Bistro Award for Jazz Vocalist following her “stunning” debut at Birdland Jazz Club in November 2022, as noted by Gerry Geddes. In 2024, she expanded her international presence with an 18-country European tour and three U.S. tours with Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox, alongside three additional tours including a Florence debut at the Teatro Niccolini with Jeff Goldblum and the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra. Her performance experience spans major concert halls, international touring circuits, and intimate venues worldwide. As All About Jazz observed in 2022, “Tawanda seems to go from zero to belonging in the esteemed company of Veronica Swift, Cecile McLorin Salvant and Cyrille Aimée in negative time, if that could be measured (All About Jazz, 2022). ” Personnel :Gabriel Schillinger-Hyman, piano. Tawanda Suessbrich-Joaquim, vocals. Michael Mitchell, drums. Nico Martinez, bass Tickets at The Gabriel Schillinger-Hyman Trio featuring Tawanda Suessbrich-Joaquim

Wayne Shorter (August 25, 1933 – March 2, 2023) was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Shorter came to prominence in the late 1950s as a member of, and eventually primary composer for Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. In the 1960s, he joined Miles Davis's Second Great Quintet, and then co-founded the jazz fusion band Weather Report. He recorded more than 20 albums as a bandleader. Many Shorter compositions have become jazz standards, and his music has earned worldwide recognition, critical praise, and commendation. Shorter won 12 Grammy Awards.He was acclaimed for his mastery of the soprano saxophone since switching his focus from the tenor in the late 1960s and beginning an extended reign in 1970 as DownBeat's annual poll-winner on that instrument, winning the critics' poll for 10 consecutive years and the readers' for 18. The New York Times music critic Ben Ratliff described Shorter in 2008 as "probably jazz's greatest living small-group composer and a contender for greatest living improviser". In 2017, he was awarded the Polar Music Prize. Oakland native Isaac Schwartz brings his band of musical collaborators and lifelong Wayne fans to pay tribute to their collective hero. The night will feature Wayne's early work with the Jazz Messengers and solo recordings all the way through to the music he made with the Wayne Shorter Quartet, which pushed boundaries for the last 20 years. Isaac first heard Wayne on his seminal album, "Speak No Evil" and fell in love with its impressionistic yet propulsive sound. The music was sensitive yet bombastic; intuitive yet clever; cryptic yet soulful. Finally when Isaac was 16, his father took him to see Wayne live. Isaac wasn't sure if the modern music Wayne was making was really his vibe and boy was he wrong. It was the greatest show he'd ever seen and got him screaming in his seat. The intensity created by Danilo Perez, John Patitucci, and Brian Blade with Wayne at the helm was undeniable. That concert changed the direction of Isaac's life and caused him to fully invest and dedicate his life to music. Isaac is honored to get to pay tribute to his musical father and guiding light in life, Wayne Shorter. ALL HAIL WAYNE! Tickets at The Isaac Schwartztet plays the Music of Wayne Shorter

Marina Crouse is one of the most notable talents on the San Francisco/Bay Area music scene. Her early classical training is reflected in her powerful and versatile vocal style that creates a genuine excitement in every performance. Blessed with an incredibly expressive voice early in life, Marina Crouse applies her distinctive talents to a wide range of material while delivering an emotional authenticity that consistently cuts deep. Marina is equally comfortable with the blues of Etta James, the soulful renderings of jazz by Ernestine Anderson & the music of her youth, the torch songs and boleros of Mexican canciones. Rather than present just one, she is presenting all of her favorite things! Featuring John R Burr on piano, Ruth Davies on bass, Deszon Claibone on drums Ticket at Marina Crouse: My Favorite Things

An evening of original and arranged compositions with stylistic influences from jazz, blues, and free improvisation. Nathan Nakadegawa-Lee - saxophone Kaz George Isaac Coyle - bass Miles Turk - drums Born and raised in Oakland, California, saxophonist, clarinetist, and composer Nathan Nakadegawa-Lee embodies a striking mix of sounds deriving from improvised, vocal, blues, and jazz traditions. He is a graduate of The New School’s Jazz and Contemporary Music program, where he studied with luminaries such as Melissa Aldana, Darius Jones, Tivon Pennicott, David Glasser, Or Bareket, Jon Irabagon, Anat Cohen, Joshua Rubin, and Ismail Lumaneovsky. In Oakland, Nathan has taught at Oakland Summer Music, Oakland Public Conservatory, and his alma mater Claremont Middle School, providing music education at no cost to middle schoolers. As a performer, Nathan has appeared alongside generational artists such as Billy Martin, Faye Carol, Azure McCall, Selendis Sebastian Alexander Johnson, and Lesley Mok. He has performed internationally in Tokyo, and the Bern Jazz Festival in Switzerland, in the Bay Area at Yoshi’s Oakland, and The Sound Room, and NYC at Dizzy’s Jazz Club, The Stone, and Le Poisson Rouge. A big supporter of community organizing, Nathan hosts eclectic house shows and Improv Nights, and continues to compose, improvise, and perform in New York City and the Bay Area. Kazemde George is an African American Jazz saxophonist, composer, and educator based in Brooklyn, NY. Raised by Caribbean parents in Berkeley, California, Kaz has been playing Saxophone, Piano and Percussion in a wide range of musical styles from an early age. Kazemde attended college in Boston where he completed the Harvard/New England Conservatory (NEC) Joint program, receiving his Bachelors in Neurobiology (Harvard) and his Masters in Jazz Composition (NEC). At NEC, Kazemde studied with Miguel Zenón, Jerry Bergonzi, Jason Moran, Cecil McBee, Donny McCaslin, Danilo Pérez, and John McNeil. In 2012, he received Harvard’s George Peabody Gardener Fellowship to study traditional music in La Habana, Cuba for ten months. Through his travels, Kaz has expanded his focus from Hip-Hop and Jazz to include the full spectrum of musical styles which blossomed from the African Diaspora, including Afro-Cuban, Afro-Caribbean, Afro-Brazilian, and African-American traditions. As he sees it, the study of these musical styles serves as a way to regain cultural histories that were lost through the processes of African-American Slavery. Today, his focus is aligned towards music, but Kazemde is also a biologist at heart, and his quest to understand this wide breadth of styles is driven by an analytical mind with a scientific approach. Isaac Coyle is a bassist, composer, and educator residing in the San Francisco Bay Area. Since graduating from the Berklee College of music in 2023, Isaac has become one of the top call bassists in the Bay Area jazz scene. In addition he is also a frequent collaborator in Terri Lyne Carrington’s New Standards band, performing throughout the country. Raised in Oakland and immersed in the Bay Area’s vibrant music community, drummer Miles Turk seeks to follow the tradition in appreciating the cultural importance of blues, bebop, jazz, etc. along with shining a light on his own musical influences coming from R&B, Hip-Hop, Funk, & many more. Tickets at Nathan Nakadegawa-Lee & Kaz George Group

Oakland’s powerhouse collective Jazz Mafia dives deep into the purple catalog for a special tribute to the music of PRINCE. From slow-burning ballads to high-octane funk anthems, this show reimagines Prince’s iconic songs through the lens of jazz, soul, and hip-hop. Led by composer/trombonist Adam Theis and featuring the electrifying vocals of Kate Lamont, the ensemble brings fresh arrangements and deep grooves to this timeless repertoire. Tickets at The Jazz Mafia Celebrate the Music of Prince 6P show

Oakland’s powerhouse collective Jazz Mafia dives deep into the purple catalog for a special tribute to the music of PRINCE. From slow-burning ballads to high-octane funk anthems, this show reimagines Prince’s iconic songs through the lens of jazz, soul, and hip-hop. Led by composer/trombonist Adam Theis and featuring the electrifying vocals of Kate Lamont, the ensemble brings fresh arrangements and deep grooves to this timeless repertoire. Tickets at The Jazz Mafia Celebrate the Music of Prince 9P Show

Mark Hummel is a Grammy-nominated blues harmonica master, vocalist, and producer with a career spanning over five decades. A key force in the modern West Coast blues sound, he’s known for his explosive harmonica style, soulful vocals, and high-energy live shows. From leading the Blues Survivors to producing his acclaimed *Blues Harmonica Blowout* series, Hummel continues to honor classic blues traditions while keeping the music powerfully alive. Playing with Mark is long-time collaborator Steve Freund (guitar), who has worked with a who’s who of blues legends, including Sunnyland Slim, James Cotton, Koko Taylor, Lonnie Brooks, Luther Allison, Otis Rush, Bo Diddley, Big Walter, Snooky Pryor, Floyd Jones, Eddie Taylor, Lee Jackson, Hubert Sumlin, Pinetop Perkins, and San Francisco’s own Boz Scaggs. Karl Sevareid , Blues Bass Legend, known for his work with Jimmy Witherspoon, Robben Ford, the Ford Blues Band, Charlie Musselwhite, and countless West Coast blues greats as well as playing alongside Eric Clapton & The Rolling Stones. Paul Revelli , a consummate drummer with diverse skills, a passion for playing and listening to all genres of music, and his intuition as the consummate sideman are evidenced by the artists he has performed and/or recorded with, including: ​B.B. King, Elvis Costello, Nick , Sammy Hagar, Joan Baez, Moby, Bonnie Raitt, Boz Scaggs, Huey Lewis, Clarence Clemmons, SugarPie DeSanto, and more. Tickets at Mark Hummel Band