$18 Cover @ the Door ($15 Seniors/Students) / Start 7pm / Doors 6:30pm / Seated Show
Last series concert of the season until next March, 2020
The Creative Music Series proudly presents
A premier appearance by
Allison Miller
(from New York)
Rising Star–Drums—Downbeat 2019 International Critics Poll
Allison Miller
"...Glitter Wolf is undeniably accessible, gloriously melodic and funky as hell."
-New York City Jazz Record
“...Miller's craftiness as a percussionist is met by her ingenuity as a composer and
group conceptualist.” - The New Yorker
“Ms. Miller is a drummer, bandleader and composer with an aesthetic of limber
poise, drawn at once to brisk maneuvers and deep grooves.” – The New Yorker
NYC-based drummer/composer/teacher Allison Miller engages her deep roots in improvisation as a vehicle to explore all music. Described by critics as a Modern Jazz Icon in the Making, Miller won Downbeat Magazine’s 67th Annual Critics Poll “Rising Star Drummer” award and her composition, “Otis Was a Polar Bear”, is included on NPR’s list of The 200 Greatest Songs by 21st Century Women+. She is also the first recipient of the Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation’s Commissioning Grant.
Miller, a three time Jazz Ambassador for the U.S. State Department and Melba Liston Fellow (New School), is Monterey Jazz Festival’s 2019 Artist in Residence, alongside bassist/producer Derrick Hodge. Simultaneously her band, Boom Tic Boom, is celebrating it’s 10th anniversary with the release of their 5th album, Glitter Wolf. NPR’s Kevin Whitehead says, “All the parts fit together like clockwork on Allison Miller's new album.” The band has toured extensively throughout the US, Europe and Asia as well as being featured on such programs as NPR’s Fresh Air with Terry Gross, Tiny Desk with Bob Boilen, WNYC’s Soundcheck and New Sounds with John Schaefer, and Jazz Night in America with Christian McBride. While breaking from leading Boom Tic Boom, Miller focuses on collaborations, co-directing Parlour Game with Jenny Scheinman and Science Fair with Carmen Staaf. Science Fair’s debut release is included in the New York Times and L.A. Times Best Jazz of 2018 list. Miller is also a proud member of the critically acclaimed Bluenote recording supergroup Artemis, and is the musical director for Camille A. Brown’s Ink.
As a side-musician, Miller has been the rhythmic force behind such artists as Sara Bareilles, Ani DiFranco, Natalie Merchant, Brandi Carlile, Toshi Reagon, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Patricia Barber, Marty Ehrlich, Ben Allison, and Late Night with Seth Meyers.
Allison teaches at the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music, Stanford Jazz Workshop, and is the Artistic Director of Jazz Camp West. She has been appointed Arts Envoy to Thailand for her work with Jazz Education Abroad and endorses Yamaha drums, Zildjian cymbals, Vic Firth sticks, Evans drumheads and Sunhouse percussion.
Carmen Staaf
Winner of the 2009 Mary Lou Williams Women in Jazz Pianist Competition!
“…Staaf dares to thrill by going through rowdy angular contortions at the same time that liberates delicious fragrances of Monk's music in the air.” - Jazz Trail
Pianist and composer Carmen Staaf is an active voice in the NYC and global music scenes. Currently, she is the pianist and Musical Director for NEA Jazz Master Dee Dee Bridgewater. Her past major performances have included the Playboy Jazz Festival in a two-piano setting with the legendary Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter, Jazz at Lincoln Center with Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, and the Kennedy Center alongside Kenny Barron and Fred Hersch. She has been heard at the Village Vanguard, Blue Note, SFJazz and major jazz festivals around the world including the Montreal and North Sea Jazz Festivals, among many others.
Carmen graduated with a double degree from Tufts University (Anthropology) and the New England Conservatory (Jazz Performance), and immediately thereafter became one of the youngest faculty members ever hired by Berklee College of Music, joining their piano department in 2005. After spending some years touring and recording while based in New York (including winning the Mary Lou Williams Jazz Pianist competition), she was accepted to the prestigious Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance.
An active educator, Carmen has held faculty positions at Berklee, the New School, Stanford Jazz Institute, Swarnabhoomi Academy of Music (Chennai, India), Jacob’s Pillow, Litchfield Jazz Camp, and the New York Jazz Academy, and has led masterclasses around the globe.
Jason Palmer
“His trumpet playing always seems upbeat and outgoing rather than moody and solipsistic. – All About Jazz
“…identified Palmer as a visionary player with an astounding vocabulary, playing music in a uniquely personal voice, which while steeped in the feats of the past, pushes inexorably towards tomorrow” – All About Jazz
Trumpeter, composer, and educator Jason Palmer is one of the most in demand musicians of his
generation. He has performed with Roy Haynes, Herbie Hancock, Jimmy Smith (the organist), Wynton
Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Ravi Coltrane, Mark Turner, Jeff
Ballard, Lee Konitz, Phil Woods, Common, Roy Hargrove, Lewis Nash.
Having made Boston, MA his home for the past 22 years, Jason was recently named to the inaugural class of the Boston Artist in Residence Fellowship for Music Composition. In 2011 and 2017, he was named a Fellow in Music Composition by the Massachusetts Cultural Council. In 2014, Jason was honored as a recipient of the French American Cultural Exchange Jazz Fellowship where he collaborated with French pianist Cedric Hanriot. Jason won 1st Place in the 2009 Carmine Caruso International Jazz Trumpet Solo Competition and was cited in the June 2007 issue of Downbeat Magazine as one of the "Top 25 trumpeters of the Future".
In addition to performing on over forty albums as a sideman, Jason has recorded thirteen albums under his own name on labels Ayva, Steeplechase, Newvelle, and most recently with Giant Step Arts. Jason has toured in over 30 countries with saxophonists Mark Turner, Greg Osby, Grace Kelly, and Matana Roberts, and has been a featured guest artist on multiple projects in Europe.
For the past fifteen years, Jason's quintet has been the house band every weekend at Boston's historic Wally's Jazz Café.
Jason Palmer offers his passion for improvised music as a full-time Assistant Professor of Ensembles and Brass of Music at the Berklee College of Music and as a board member at JazzBoston. Jason has also served as an Assistant Professor at Harvard University and at New England Conservatory. He has also served on the faculty at the New School of Jazz and Contemporary Music in New York City.
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The Creative Music Series (CMS) was established in January, 2015, to showcase the work of adventurous jazz musicians from out-of-state, presenting them in intimate venues in the Cambridge/Somerville area. My endeavor was a reaction to the apparent lack of invitations being extended to accomplished, new talent and even unknown musicians to the Boston area. CMS has now begun to zero in on Boston based musicians who are creating their own projects with these out-of-town guests, and taking these musical risks to find an expression and gain a wider appreciation.