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Joe Gilman

Dr. Joe Gilman is the music director of the Brubeck Institute's Fellowship Program, a full-time professor of music at American River College in Sacramento, and music director of Capital Jazz Project. He has received bachelor's degrees in classical piano and jazz studies at Indiana University, a master's degree in jazz and the contemporary media from the Eastman School of Music, and a doctoral degree in education from the University of Sarasota.

Joe has been the primary pianist with jazz vibraphonist Bobby Hutcherson since September 2006, and has also performed professionally with Eddie Harris, Woody Shaw, Marlena Shaw, Richie Cole, Joe Locke, George Duke, Chris Botti, Eric Alexander, David "Fathead" Newman, and Slide Hampton, and has recorded with Joe Henderson, Jeff Watts, and Robert Hurst.

Dr. Gilman has twice been an International Jazz Ambassador through the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and USIA, traveling to West Africa in 1999 and East and Southern Africa in 2000. He won the 1998 Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Commission Emerging Artist Award and the 2000 Sacramento News and Review SAMMIES Critical Achievement award for contribution to the arts community. Joe was the 2001 American River College Student Association Instructor of the Year and was named the first Brubeck Scholar at the 2005 Brubeck Festival. In 2004, Joe won the Great American Jazz Piano Competition in Jacksonville, Florida. Dr. Gilman's work with students at the Brubeck Institute has produced several CDs - Brubeck Revisited Vols. 1 and 2 (Sunnyside) and Wonder Revisited Vols. 1 and 2 (Capri), all recorded with Brubeck Institute fellows Joe Sanders and Justin Brown, and the double CD of the 2006-2007 Brubeck Institute Jazz Quintet. His work with the 2006-2007 Fellowship students also resulted in four 2007 DownBeat magazine student awards.

You can read a review about the 2004 Great American Jazz Piano Competition at All About Jazz.


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Album Review

Henry Robinett Quartet: Jazz Standards Volume 2: Then Again

Read "Jazz Standards Volume 2: Then Again" reviewed by Pierre Giroux


Guitarist Henry Robinett is a patient man. In April 2000, when he was between gigs and bands, he brought together several top players from Northern California and, in two days, recorded two albums the first of which was called Jazz Standards, Volume 1: Then (Nefertiti 2019) . Now with the release of Jazz Standards Volume 2: Then Again we have the complete output from this aggregation which, in addition to Robinett, includes Joe Gilman on piano, ...

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Album Review

Beth Duncan: I'm All Yours

Read "I'm All Yours" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey


As fertile and durable as the Great American Songbook is, like fossil fuels it is not an infinite and forgiving loam. It is a splendid jumping-off point, both historically and contemporarily, for the swan dive into jazz. At least tangentially, it also serves as the creative spark, igniting new, more progressive composition. This is where Sacramento-based singer Beth Duncan and, by extension, composer & lyricist Martine Tabilio deftly enter the picture. Duncan's previous two recordings Orange Colored Sky ...

5
Album Review

Henry Robinett Quartet: Jazz Standards, Volume 1: Then

Read "Jazz Standards, Volume 1: Then" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


Back in April of 2000, guitarist Henry Robinett convened a quartet in The Hangar, a Sacramento studio where he had been working as an engineer and producer. An intentionally casual session, it was all standards all the way. Over the course of two days, tracks were called, solos and some other specifics were sorted out, and the music just flowed. When all was said and done, Robinett left and put the material on the shelf...where it sat for nearly two ...

1
Album Review

Joe Gilman: Relativity

Read "Relativity" reviewed by Edward Blanco


The concept of interpreting art and other visual works into a piece of music, is probably not an easy thing to realize, yet on Americanvas (Capri, 2010), pianist Joe Gilman successfully accomplished this feat, drawing his inspiration from the art world using paintings as vehicles for jazz improvisation. Relativity follows the same theme, this time focusing on the works of Dutch graphic artist Maurtis Cornelis Escher better known as M.C. Escher where Dr. Gilman, music Director of the Brubeck Institute's ...

2
Album Review

Joe Gilman: Relativity

Read "Relativity" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


M.C. Escher captured the imagination of the world with his perspective-altering artwork. Escher's mind's eye and eye's mind challenged people to see things differently, and pianist Joe Gilman has found inspiration in his brilliant work. Gilman, who previously delved into the music-inspired-by-art realm on Americanvas (Capri, 2010), uses Escher's creations as inspirational seeds and guiding forces for this music. He takes a good, hard look at eleven of Escher's pieces, with music written to capture what he saw.

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Album Review

Joe Gilman: Americanvas

Read "Americanvas" reviewed by Woodrow Wilkins


Originality plus artistic vision equals an irresistible palette for jazz. Pianist Joe Gilman, music director of the Brubeck Institute's fellowship program, mixes both elements with Americanvas, musical interpretations of 10 American paintings. “Gossip" begins with a spirited solo piano that shifts gears a few times before bringing in the rest of the band. The saxophones lead in a series of frenetic, stop-time phrases. Bass and drums are fully engaged behind the soloists, starting with the alto sax, followed ...

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Album Review

Joe Gilman: Americanvas

Read "Americanvas" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay


Pianist Joe Gilman leads a young and talented quintet on Americanvas, an album of original tunes inspired by American artists such as Mark Rothko, Edward Hopper and Norman Rockwell. Jazz that takes its inspiration from the visual arts is not rare--British saxophonist Andy Sheppard's Movements In Colour (ECM, 2009) was so inspired, for example. Like Sheppard, Gilman's varied choices are reflected in the music's range of styles and moods ensuring that this is a constantly intriguing recording. ...

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Award / Grant

Joe Gilman Wins 2004 Great American Jazz Piano Competition

Joe Gilman Wins 2004 Great American Jazz Piano Competition

Source: All About Jazz


"Joe Gilman is certainly one of the greatest pianists I've ever heard. I am truly amazed with the trio's imaginative interpretations of my music. I laughed and hollered out loud at every track, hearing their rhythmic, harmonic, and swinging versions of my tunes."

~Dave Brubeck

"He's unbelievably talented! As soon as I write something down, he completely understands. He understands the chords that are contained within the scale … of the possibilities depending on the way the melody is. On how to approach it and at the same time give me space. And how to drop a color out there and fill it in the canvas and let it drip down the canvas and then say you want to play some."

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Concerts

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Jazz Standards Volume...

Nefertiti Records
2021

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I'm All Yours

Saccat Records
2020

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Jazz Standards,...

Nefertiti Records
2020

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Samadhi

Manricks Music Records
2020

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Relativity

Capri Records
2013

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Relativity

Capri Records
2012

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