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David Berkman

Since moving to New York in 1985, David Berkman has been an important part of the jazz community. He is an award-winning composer/bandleader (2000 Doris Duke/Chamber Music America New Works Creation and Presentation Grant), a recording artist whose 4 Palmetto recordings have appeared on numerous best records of the year critic's lists (the New York Times, the Village Voice, Downbeat, JazzIz, Jazz Times and others) and an award-winning jazz clinician who has performed and taught at numerous jazz camps, universities and conservatories around the United States, South America and Europe. He has played in countless bands including those of Cecil McBee, Tom Harrell and the Vanguard Orchestra and has performed with and/or recorded and/or arranged for numerous jazz luminaries, including: Sonny Stitt,, Brian Blade, Joe Lovano, Dave Douglas, Ray Drummond, Billy Hart, Dick Oatts, Tony Malaby, Chris Potter, Scott Wendholt, Lenny White, Scott Colley, Craig Handy, Steven Bernstein, Bill Stewart, Dave Stryker, Fathead Newman, Hank Crawford, and Jane Monheit. He has published two books with Sher Music Publishing, “The Jazz Musician’s Guide to Creative Practicing” (2007) and “The Jazz Singer’s Guidebook” (2009). Now appearing more and more often as a bandleader, David Berkman has performed solo and with his quartet, quintet and sextet at festivals and clubs in the United States, Europe and Japan, most recently at the North Sea Festival, the Edinburgh festival, the Belfast festival and the Cork Festival. Recent tours include: clubs and concert performances in Switzerland, the Netherlands, Austria, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Ireland, Spain, Italy, Brazil, Japan, Korea, New Zealand and around the United States. Recent projects include the New York Standards Quartet (featuring Tim Armacost, Yosuke Inoue and Gene Jackson) and piano/trumpet duo performances with Dave Douglas (2005 International Trumpet Guild Convention in Bangkok) and Tom Harrell (around Italy).

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Liner Notes

Ark Ovrutski: 44/33

Read "Ark Ovrutski: 44/33" reviewed by Howard Mandel


Wherever a jazz musician starts their professional journey, he or she must come to grips with what one must do to create a personal approach based on technique, imagination and feeling. Composer and bassist Ark Ovrutski likes to say that since the age of 20 he has been an “international homeless traveller." But with the release of 44/33, his third album as a leader, Ark proves he has arrived. With its program of bright melodies, tight ensemble collaboration, ...

3
Album Review

Alexis Parsons: Alexis

Read "Alexis" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci


Alexis Parsons is an honest-to-goodness jazz singer. She has considerable vocal chops, a wide range and great time. She usually comes in right on or slightly behind the beat. Except when she does not. Which makes for considerable contrast and interest. Her sense of drama is apropos ("Organ Grinder" may be the sole exception, but de gustibus) and you often have the sense you are listening to an instrumentalist rather than a singer. Or to put it differently, Ms Parsons ...

22
Album Review

Alexis Parsons: Alexis

Read "Alexis" reviewed by Jack Bowers


The self-named Alexis is the third album by New York-based vocalist Alexis Parsons. To showcase her talents, she has chosen a medley of standards (half a dozen) and lesser-known but engaging originals, opening and closing with the Cole Porter classics “Easy to Love" and “In the Still of the Night." Rodgers and Hart, the Gershwins, Kurt Weill, Astrud Gilberto and even Franz Schubert are also represented. For back-up, Parsons employs two trios—pianist David Berkman, bassist Drew Gress and drummer Matt ...

8
Album Review

David Berkman: David Berkman Plays Music By John Coltrane And Pete Seeger

Read "David Berkman Plays Music By John Coltrane And Pete Seeger" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


Formative influences rarely fit into neat categories. At a certain, impressionable age, some music, like yet unlike anything else, simply manages to seep into a youngster's consciousness. What that particular music may be, who performs it, and what it carries within and beyond its notes and/or words, is something to be sorted out at a later date. But the seeds of influence and interest are sowed at that early stage, and that's something that David Berkman knows all too well. ...

Album Review

David Berkman: Old Friends and New Friends

Read "Old Friends and New Friends" reviewed by Vincenzo Roggero


I vecchi e i nuovi amici sono quelli che il pianista e compositore David Berkman riunisce in studio di registrazione per dar vita al nuovo album intitolato per l'appunto Old Friends and New Friends. Ma il riferimento è anche alla Palmetto Records etichetta con la quale Berkman debuttò nel lontano 1998, collaborò fino al 2004 prima di riannodare le fila di una proficua collaborazione con questo lavoro. Scritte nel corso dell'ultimo anno -alcune poche giorni prima della ...

3
Album Review

David Berkman: Old Friends And New Friends

Read "Old Friends And New Friends" reviewed by Budd Kopman


With Old Friends and New Friends, pianist/composer David Berkman reunites with the Palmetto label, as well as Matt Balitsaris, who both founded the label and was the recording engineer. Berkman nostalgically describes the process of making the earlier recordings as a group undertaking where disparate personalties are melded into a whole to produce a distinct sound. Besides Balitsaris, this recording features drummer Brian Blade and saxophonists Adam Kolker and Billy Drewes, who are the “old friends" from recordings ...

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Album Review

David Berkman: Old Friends And New Friends

Read "Old Friends And New Friends" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


Pianist David Berkman has come full circle with Old Friends And New Friends. He's back on Palmetto records, the label that released his first four records as a leader between 1998 and 2004; Matt Balitsaris, who helped shape and capture the sound on those albums, is back at the helm, serving as engineer, co-producer and sounding board for Berkman; and Brian Blade, the always in-demand drummer who appeared on three of Berkman's Palmetto releases, has returned to the fold. But ...

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Performance / Tour

Michael Janisch receives prestigious Arts Council Touring Grant for April UK Tour featuring Tim Armacost, Gene Jackson and David Berkman

Michael Janisch receives prestigious Arts Council Touring Grant for April UK Tour featuring Tim Armacost, Gene Jackson and David Berkman

Source: Michael Janisch

Acoustic Bassist and Whirlwind Recordings label boss Michael Janisch has just been awarded a prestigious Touring Grant by the Arts Council England for his major April 2012 UK tour featuring three marquee New York based musicians in saxophonist Tim Armacost (Jeff 'Tain' Watts, Tom Harrell), pianist David Berkman (Joe Lovano, Brian Blade) and drummer Gene Jackson (Herbie Hancock, Dave Holland), collectively known as the New York Standards Quartet. The tour takes place from the 7th-23rd of April and will see ...

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Recording

David Berkman Quartet Live at Smoke

David Berkman Quartet Live at Smoke

Source: Michael Ricci

DAVID BERKMAN QUARTET Live at Smoke (Challenge)

Heres an album underlining the importance of the small jazz club Smoke, on Broadway and 106th Street, just as that club has found itself in a serious fix. Smoke was flooded by the buildings sprinkler system after it was set off by smoke or fire last week on an upper floor of the building. The club needs thorough reconstruction and a new sound system yet still hopes to reopen this week. Hear this ...

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Event

Abigail Riccards Live at Trumpets with Bill Goodwin, David Berkman, and Evan Gregor

Abigail Riccards Live at Trumpets with Bill Goodwin, David Berkman, and Evan Gregor

Source: All About Jazz

Abigail Riccards with Bill Goodwin, David Berkman, and Evan Gregor Sunday, Sept. 16, 2007 4-7pm Trumpets 6 Depot Square Montclair, NJ About Abigail Riccards: Since coming to New York in 2003, Abigail Riccards is already making a name for herself. Last summer, she toured the middle-east, playing a week tour in Yemen for the United States State Department. In 2004 Abigail was selected to be a semifinalist in the Thelonious Monk International ...

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Event

New Haven's Firehouse 12 To Present David Berkman Quartet October 6th

New Haven's Firehouse 12 To Present David Berkman Quartet October 6th

Source: Improvised Communications

Friday, October 6th at 8:30 and 10:00 p.m. David Berkman Quartet Firehouse 12 45 Crown Street in New Haven, CT Tickets are $15 (opening set) and $10 (second set) Tickets and info are available online or at (203) 785-0468

David Berkman, piano/composer; Jimmy Greene, saxophones; Thomas Morgan, bass; Ted Poor, drums

New York pianist/composer David Berkman will bring his quartet to New Haven for a two-set October 6th ...

Photos

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Short Stories

Self -released
2023

buy

Alexis

New Artists Records
2021

buy

David Berkman Plays...

Without Records
2020

buy

Six of One

Palmetto Records
2019

buy

Old Friends And New...

Palmetto Records
2015

buy

44/33

Zoho
2014

buy

Blowing Smoke

From: Six of One
By David Berkman

West 180th Street

From: Old Friends And New Friends
By David Berkman

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