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Cecilia Smith

The good ones often start young. Cecilia Smith was eight when she began taking piano lessons in Cleveland first with Margaret Heller and later with Earl Todd, who told her, you are good enough to make music your profession. When she was twelve, Cecilia studied with Ronald Papalio, adding drums and percussion to her music exploration, and at fourteen moved on to mallet percussion. In her teens she expanded her studies to include composition, working with David Kechley, a doctoral student at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

Cecilia attended Berklee College of Music in Boston, where in addition to studying arranging, composition and film scoring, she studied vibes with Ed Saindon and Mike Hatfield and improvisation and composition with Andy Jaffee and other noted faculty. Following graduation she continued studying with members of Berklee's faculty. Cecilia studied vibes with Gary Burton and improvisation with Charlie Banocas. In 1989 she joined them and taught at Berklee for four years before moving to New York City. Cecilia continued to study after moving to Brooklyn. She studied composing and arranging with Cecil Bridgewater and improvisation with Billy Pierce.

Over the past 30 years, Cecilia has built a multifaceted career in music as a performer in concert halls, nightclubs and festivals throughout North and South America, Europe, Asia and West Africa, as a composer/arranger and teacher.

In 2000, Ms. Smith was asked to present a concert devoted to compositional work of Mary Lou Williams at Our Lady of Victory RCC where several senior church members had known Ms. Williams. In preparation for this gig, Cecilia studied Mary Lou Williams' archives. The breath and complexity of Ms. Williams' work—comprising more than 350 compositions and including works for Big Band, Small Ensemble and Chorus—was mind-blowing. This research led her to a multiple year Artist-in Residence at New England Conservatory of Music's – Jazz Studies Department where she was able to further study, lecture and perform MLW's work. Mary Lou Williams became Cecilia's passion. And Cecilia's desire to expose audiences to Ms. Williams' compositional work evolved into The Mary Lou Williams' Resurgence Project (MLWRP).

In 2005 the MLWRP presented the Sacred and Secular Music of Mary Lou Williams, a concert that included a big band, choir and vocalist, at The Kennedy Center in Washington DC. Following the DC concert, Mike Joyce wrote in the Washington Post,

"Her (Cecilia's) research provided the impetus for Friday night's multifaceted concert, featuring the Mary Lou Williams Resurgence Big Band, led by Smith, and the Morgan State choir, under the direction of Eric Conway. When the two ensembles joined forces in the second half of the program, the sheer intensity of their union was something to behold, sounding dramatically unlike anything heard at the festival in previous years. The performances of Williams' I Have a Dream, based on the Martin Luther King Jr. speech, and her gospel anthem Come Holy Spirit were particularly eloquent and exhilarating."

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Radio & Podcasts

George Coleman, David Larsen, Mary Lou Williams & Cecilia Smith

Read "George Coleman, David Larsen, Mary Lou Williams & Cecilia Smith" reviewed by Joe Dimino


We begin the 804th episode with a vibraphonist Cecilia Smith and music from the Mary Lou Williams Resurgence Project. From there, we hear from Mary Lou Williams herself with a live recording from 1936. Throughout this episode, we hear new music from George Coleman, Ben Rosenblum, Walter Smith III and Snarky Puppy. In between, we go old school with Joe Morris and His Orchestra, Curtis Lundy and Jackie Gleason. It all comes to a close with baritone saxophonist David Larsen ...

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The Jazz Session

Cecilia Smith: Chronicle Of A Life Embraced

Read "Cecilia Smith: Chronicle Of A Life Embraced" reviewed by Jason Crane


On the new episode of The Jazz Session, Jason Crane interviews vibraphonist and composer Cecilia Smith. Smith's new project, Dark Triumph (CEA Music, 2005) chronicles the life of her aunt, Victoria Lancaster Smith, through spoken word, improvisation, orchestral arrangements, members of the Boys Choir of Harlem, and a jazz rhythm section. This ambitious album originated when Victoria Smith showed Cecilia Smith an 8-bar melody she'd been carrying around in her head for six decades.Listen ...

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Album Review

Cecilia Smith: Dark Triumph: The Life of Victoria Lancaster Smith

Read "Dark Triumph: The Life of Victoria Lancaster Smith" reviewed by Michael P. Gladstone


For some reason, after listening to Dark Triumph, I am reminded of a 1967 Impulse! album by Oliver Nelson titled Musical Tribute to JFK: The Kennedy Dream. Although it took Nelson several years to compose and record original material to memorialize the Kennedy White House years, his use of soundbites from JFK's speeches, mingled with his own musical works, served to further remember the Kennedy years in the aftermath of the asssassination. What was most striking was Nelson's use of ...

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Album Review

Cecilia Smith: Dark Triumph

Read "Dark Triumph" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan


Victoria L. Smith was born in Baltimore, Maryland in 1931. She was the first black nurse hired in St Charles Hospital in Toledo, Ohio. She served in the Red Cross and the Peace Corps. By the measure of fame and popular recognition, she is an ordinary woman, but by another measure--the real and truthful one--she is an exceptional human being.As an African-American born in her time in history, Victoria L. Smith was the victim of the American soul's ...

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Technology

The Jazz Session: Cecilia Smith

The Jazz Session: Cecilia Smith

Source: All About Jazz

On the new episode of The Jazz Session, Jason Crane interviews vibraphonist and composer Cecilia Smith. Smith's new project, Dark Triumph (CEA Music, 2005) chronicles the life of her aunt, Victoria Lancaster Smith, through spoken word, improvisation, orchestral arrangements, members of the Boys Choir of Harlem, and a jazz rhythm section. This ambitious album originated when Victoria Smith showed Cecilia Smith an 8-bar melody she'd been carrying around in her head for six decades.

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About the show: The Jazz ...

...The legacy of the pianist and composer, (Mary Lou Williams) who died in 1981, has always been a spiritual touchstone for the (Kennedy Center MLW Festival), festival performances, but this year it triggered a jubilant celebration, the mood charged by secular and sacred sounds alike. … Vibraphonist, arranger and bandleader Cecilia Smith saw to that. Mike Joyce

Primary Instrument

Vibraphone

Willing to teach

Advanced only

Credentials/Background

Graduate and formal faculty member of BERKLEE COLLEGE OF MUSIC

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Dark Triumph

CEA Music Company
2006

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Dark Triumph: The...

CEA Music Company
2006

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