$10 Cover @ the Door / Start 8:30pm / Doors 8pm / Seated Show
Maxwell Salinger-Ridley is a musician, composer and educator based in Boston. He first started participating in music by singing in the school choir and playing bass guitar in a punk band after school. He began his formal studies in high school at the Boston Arts Academy and it was there that he first fell in love with improvised music and the upright bass. While at Boston Arts Academy, he was selected out of many other young musicians to perform at Boston’s Symphony Hall with the Boston Pops three years in a row. He was also a part of the Berklee City Music program and through it, had the honor to perform with and be mentored by renown artist such as Quincy Jones and Delfeayo Marsalis while still in high school. He was awarded full-tuition scholarships to study at Berklee College of Music for both undergraduate and graduate degrees, earning his graduate degree from the Berklee Global Jazz Institute under the direction of master pianist and educator Danilo Perez. An equally important part of his education was down the street from Berklee at Boston’s historic Wally’s Jazz Cafe. He began going to jam sessions there in high school and more recently, has been the house bass player every Friday and Saturday night.
Ridley has shared the stage with renown musicians such as Jeff Coffin, Kenny Werner, DOMi & JD Beck, Tia Fuller, Ralph Peterson, Terri Lyne Carrington, Jack Dejohnette, Bruce Molsky, Fransico Mela, Walter Smith III and Jerry Bergonzi. He has performed in venues such as the Blue Note, Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, the Monterey Jazz Festival and the Umbria Jazz Festival. He has played many different styles of music all over the US, Canada and Europe, traveling by plane and staying in hotels, as well as by van and sleeping on couches and floors. Today he is active in New England as a sideman, leader and co-leader for many different groups, both on stage and in the recording studio. He also teaches music as a guest lecturer at different colleges around New England (such as Longy School of Music and the University of New Hampshire) and at the Hamilton-Garrett Music and Arts Academy. He has also spent some time living in Valencia Spain and considers that his second home and musical community.
Gregory Groover Jr., Tenor saxophone
Anonymous Masked Drummer, drums
Max Ridley, bass