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SATURDAY NOVEMBER 19, 5:00 PM
Victor Garcia Group
The history of jazz is, as we all know, made up of multiple social, geographical and cultural mutations, thereby making it possible to identify in its trajectory several decisive gravitational poles that contributed to the hybridism in jazz’s identity. The region of the Mississippi, in the depths of the United States of America, benefits from a statute of prominence since it was in that rural landscape inhabited by slave-owners and African slaves that a new musical language which to this day remains pertinent and vital in the context of global culture. However, after the first spontaneous waves of migration to the urban centers, where the path to modernity was beginning to take shape, took place, several other styles of jazz natural started to erupt. As time went by, Chicago became one of the crucial creative nuclei of this genre due to its confluence of a great Afro-American jazz tradition with the cosmopolitism of the great metropolis, which partially explains why Chicago attracts so many musicians determined to pursue a career in music. Victor Garcia, a talented trumpeter and composer of Latin-American descent, is currently one of the representatives of the new generation of Chicago’s jazz.
Victor Garcia (b. 1983) was born to a family of musical tradition and soon began to display a special interest in the trumpet, inspired by jazz legends such as Dizzy Gillespie or Freddie Hubbard. In his academic period, during which he played in several bands of Latin music, Garcia became more and more immersed in jazz (both studying as well as collaborating with top-level jazz musicians), and around the same time he founded, alongside pianist Darwin Noguera, the Chicago Afro-Latin Jazz Ensemble, his first project as a leader. Since then, the trumpeter has collaborated with stellar names of contemporary music such as, among many others, Aretha Franklin, Branford Marsalis and Randy Brecker, and has performed around the world, while at the same time teaching music in North-American universities.
Ben Lewis is a North-American pianist with a multifaceted career in music that includes collaborations with, among others, trumpeter Tito Carrillo and singer Typhanie Monique. A versatile and eclectic musician praised for his technical skills, Lewis is also, along with actor and bassist Gary Sinise, the founding member and musical director of the Lt. Dan Band, an ensemble whose main mission is to pay tribute to the soldiers and war veterans of the USA Army.
Joshua Ramos is a native of Puerto Rico currently based in Chicago, in whose jazz scene he is an active participant. Ramos has collaborated with numerous emergent musicians of contemporary North-American jazz such as Marquis Hill or Makaya McCraven and performed all around the world with pianist and composer Ramsey Lewis’ band.
Currently based in Chicago, North-American drummer Gregory Artry began his musical career in Indianapolis, where he grew up, having collaborated with several important musicians of the city’s local jazz scene, such as Melvin Rhyne and Pharez Whitted. Since then, he has pursued creative partnerships with influential jazz musicians such as, among others, Bobby Broom and Charles McPherson.
A native of New York and currently based in Chicago, vocalist and artist Jill Katona is a graduate of Brown University whose trajectory in music has been guided by the cartographic search for musical experiences in different contexts and geographies – from performances with big bands in Holland to performances in South-Africa’s jazz bars.