MAIN CONCERT PROGRAMME - Serbian National Theatre - Friday, 18th November 2011.
RON CARTER 'GOLDEN STRIKER TRIO'
RON CARTER, bass, lead
KEVIN EUBANKS, guitar
MULGREW MILLER, piano
RON CARTER
Ron Carter is among the most original, prolific, and  influential bassists in jazz. With more than 2,500 albums to his credit, he has recorded with many of music's greats: Tommy Flanagan, Gil Evans, Lena Horne, Bill Evans, B.B. King, the Kronos Quartet, Dexter Gordon, Wes Montgomery, and Bobby Timmons. In the early 1960s he performed throughout the United States in concert halls and nightclubs with Jaki Byard and Eric Dolphy.
He later toured Europe with Cannonball Adderley. From 1963 to 1968, he was a member of the classic and acclaimed Miles Davis Quintet. He was named Outstanding Bassist of the Decade by the Detroit News, Jazz Bassist of the Year by Downbeat magazine, and Most Valuable Player by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences.
In 1993 Ron Carter earned a Grammy award for Best Jazz Instrumental Group, the Miles Davis Tribute Band and another Grammy in 1998 for Call 'Sheet Blues', an instrumental composition from the film 'Round Midnight. In addition to scoring and arranging music for many films, including some projects for Public Broadcasting System, Carter has composed music for A Gathering of Old Men, starring Lou Gosset Jr., The Passion of Beatrice directed by Bertrand Tavernier, and Blind Faith starring Courtney B. Vance.
Carter shares his expertise in the series of books he authored, among which are Building Jazz Bass Lines and The Music of Ron Carter; the latter contains 130 of his published and recorded compositions. Carter earned a bachelor of music degree from the Eastman School in Rochester and a master's degree in double bass from the Manhattan School of Music in New York City. He has also received two honorary doctorates, from the New England Conservatory of Music and the Manhattan School of Music, and was the 2002 recipient of the prestigious Hutchinson Award from the Eastman School at the University of Rochester.
Carter has lectured, conducted, and performed at clinics and master classes, instructing jazz ensembles and teaching the business of music at numerous universities. He was Artistic Director of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Studies while it was located in Boston and, after 18 years on the faculty of the Music Department of The City College of New York, he is now Distinguished Professor Emeritus although, as a performer, he remains as active as ever. In 2010 Ron Carter received the order “Commandeur dans l’ordre des Arts et des Lettres” of the French Republic.
KEVIN EUBANKS
Eubanks was born in Philadelphia into a highly musical family, between his respected pianist and pedagogue mother, Vera, who holds a Masters Degree; notable Jazz and Blues pianist uncle Ray Bryant; and Kevin’s accomplished brothers Robin—considered one of the greatest living trombonists—and the fine trumpeter Duane. Kevin was first drawn into music listening to the energetic sounds of fusion and progressive rock, then went on to study at Berklee. He has played with icons including McCoy Tyner, Art Blakey, Roy Haynes, Dave Holland and Ron Carter. In his own distinctive early career, Eubanks released many recordings for Elektra, GRP and Blue Note before his current signing with Mack Avenue in 2010. In his band, Eubanks has a powerful rhythm section ally in drummer Marvin “Smitty” Smith, who, like Eubanks, was a commanding presence on the music scene before heading west to the “Tonight Show” bandstand. Completing the ranks of this bold unit, which deftly combines “fusion” in the best sense with other stylistic turns, are saxophonist Bill Pierce, who holds the Woodwind Chair at the prestigious Berklee College of Music, keyboardist Gerry Etkins and bassist Rene Camacho. Zen Food evokes a sense of diversity and also collective continuity, qualities long in the making, and now ready to “hit the road” in a global way.
As for his long stint as musical foil for Jay Leno, Eubanks asserts, “I enjoyed the job. I enjoyed learning all these new things and meeting new people, and just seeing another side of what I didn’t know. Where I cut my teeth, I was never privy to what happens in Hollywood, by and large. I heard about it and knew a few people here and there. So, to get a bird’s eye view of all that was fascinating, and it still is.”
As he is quick to clarify, with a laugh, “I can’t very well say, oh, I’ll just go back to what I did. I’m a product of both things now, and happily so. I embrace everything I've learned and continue to learn about the mysterious ways of Hollywood.”
This “new” chapter in Eubanks’ life is, as he says, “not so foreign, because that’s all I used to do. It’s just at a different level. Musically, I’m at a different level, as well as personally. Everything is in a progressive state, with more experience in a lot of areas. It should be an interesting adventure.”
Speaking of his new chapter, Eubanks reasons that, “as physical and emotional human beings, we go through different phases in our life. I just think it was time for a change, for all the right reasons. It was a natural process, and I respected that. I thought, ‘ok, then do it.’ At the time that I took the job, I'd been on the road for 15 years, and I was tired of saying goodbye to everyone that I met. I thought it would be nice to be in one place for a while. I never dreamed it would turn into 18 years. It’s kind of the same process.”
MULGREW MILLER
Mulgrew Miller was born in Greenwood, Mississippi, in 1955. His early musical experience included Gospel, Rhythm & blues and Classical European.
Mulgrew attended the Memphis State University, where he heard the legendary Phineas Newborn, and formed a lasting friendship with another impressive young pianist, James Williams, whom he credits with providing an early musical sense of direction. His professional career started, aged twenty, with the Duke Ellington Orchestra, led by the late Mercer Ellington. During his formative years as a sideman, Mulgrew worked with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers and Betty Carter's group. Later, he was one of the founding members of Tony Williams' Quintet.
The experience gained with such luminaries allowed Mulgrew to rapidly become established as one of the most in demand pianists in the New York scene. During the nineties Mulgrew developed his career as a leader of his own trios/quintets, recording an impressive series of albums for Landmark and RCA/Novus. In 1995 Mulgrew toured Europe and the US sharing the stage with fellow pianist Kenny Barron. Mulgrew has also been noticed in various all star groups, such as The New York Jazz Giants or the Tribute to Jazz at the Philharmonic, and has recorded with almost every known Jazz artist in the scene, from Joe Lovano to Nicholas Payton. In fact, Mulgrew remains one of the most recorded pianists in the scene today, second only to Kenny Barron. Since 1999, Mulgrew has been working with virtuoso bassist Niels-Henning Orsted Pedersen: together they have recorded a wonderful CD for Bang & Olufsen featuring the music of Duke Ellington and Jimmy Blanton.
A highly original composer, Mulgrew has moved, as an interpreter, from such influences as McCoy Tyner and Wynton Kelly to become very recognizably his own man, powerful, lyrical, and imaginative.
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