Primary Instrument: Bass
Bassist Paul Beaudry enjoys an exceptional career as a performer, composer, producer, and educator. He has performed and/or recorded throughout the United States and Europe with great jazz artists like Clark Terry, Jimmy Cobb, Frank Wess, Cecil Bridgewater, Roy Hargrove, Eddie Henderson, Steve Turre, and Wycliffe Gordon. Beaudry currently tours with the Bennie Wallace Quartet, Allan Harris, Eric Lewis Trio, and Alvin Atkinson and the Sound Merchants. He performs regularly in the New York area with Eric Lewis, Lafayette Harris, and the Fabulous Soul Shakers. He also leads his own trios, quartets, and quintets featuring his favorite songs, original music and original arrangements.
An active composer, Beaudry has written large scale and short form compositions in the classical and jazz idiom. He wrote his first piece for orchestra “My Grandfather's Clock” at age 19 with no formal training in composition. His most progressive jazz work, a 1 hour 6-movement jazz suite for 12 instruments, debuted in 1998, “The Billy Childs Suite, Op. 1” which was much talked about and well-received by audience and critics. One of his jazz ballads “I'll Always Miss You” is featured on the Eric Lewis CD “Hopscotch”. His writing has earned him an affiliation as a SESAC writer and publisher under his own Beaudry Bass Music.
Beaudry has produced recordings and arranged numerous compositions for artists in the jazz, folk, world music, and popular music genres. He produced, arranged, and played bass on Buyu Ambroise “Blues in Red” project which fused Haitian drum and dance music with jazz, a successful project which was released by Justin Time Records (JTR 8506-2). He also produced the debut recording of Christian folk singer-songwriter, Todd McDonald, entitled “Changes.” Currently Beaudry is co-producing the debut recording of the up and coming jazz pianist and singer, Ellen Starr.
Paul Beaudry's jazz bass playing is influenced by the great bass masters notably: Ray Brown, Paul Chambers, Ron Carter, and Buster Williams. He studies the music not only for his own sake but to teach the next generation as well. As a committed educator, Beaudry has taught at the Teachers College at Columbia University, Hunter College, York College, Hunter College High School, and the Stanford Jazz Workshop. He has given masterclasses, clinics and workshops for students and young musicians throughout the United States and has been a lecturer and clinician for the Colden Center Jazz Project at Queens College since 2001.
A San Francisco native, Beaudry started out his musical studies at age 5 on piano and age 8 on drums. He continued playing piano and drums until he took up electric bass at age 18 and acoustic bass 2 years later. Growing up in the diverse Bay Area scene he listened to and was influenced by many different styles of music such as: Blues, Latin Jazz, Funk, Progressive Rock, Gospel, and Fusion.
While attending California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo as a Computer Science major the calling to become a professional jazz musician grew stronger. He began studying bass with John Clayton, Alphonso Johnson and composition with Billy Childs. Beaudry was awarded the Berklee College of Music in Los Angeles Scholarship in 1994 and the San Francisco Jazz Festival Scholarship in 1995. These scholarships allowed him to pursue music full-time starting with the 1996 Jazz Bass Fellowship to perform and study at the world-renown Aspen Music Festival.
Wanting to finish what he started, Beaudry completed his computer degree and a couple of internships with IBM and Apple Computer then followed the music and moved to the East Coast, first living in Boston, MA where he earned a B.M. in Classical Composition from Berklee College of Music and where he became one of the top bassists in the New England area. He began performing and recording with greats at this time having played in the Tiger Okoshi Quartet and on two recordings with local bands featuring Billy Pierce and Gary Thomas. In 1999 he was the runner-up in the International Society of Bassists Jazz Competition.
Soon after, in 2001, he moved to New York City where he was able to study with Rufus Reid and Buster Williams as well as perform with the likes of Charlie Persip, Billy Harper, Cyrus Chestnut, Antonio Hart, Don Braden, Wess Anderson, Winard Harper, Bruce Barth, Steve Slagle, Dena DeRose, Mike Longo, Cynthia Scott, Miles Griffith, Ron Blake, Joel Frahm, and many others. 2002 was a very good year, Beaudry was selected as a member for Jazz Aspen's JAS Academy directed by Christian McBride, the Steans Institute for Young Artists at the Ravinia Music Festival directed by David Baker, and the Kennedy Center's Betty Carter Jazz Ahead Program directed by Nathan Davis. Beaudry now holds a M.A. in Jazz Performance from Queens College and is a very in-demand musician in New York and beyond. You can hear him on the recent CD releases: Eric Lewis “Hopscotch” (in DVD as well), Buyu Ambroise “Blues In Red”, Buyu Ambroise “Marasa”, Sedric Choukroun “In The Parlor”, and Fredrick Levore “Skin Diver”.
