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Randy Porter

Jazz pianist Randy Porter has a refined understanding of improvisation and the spontaneous communication between musicians. As a Steinway Artist, Randy Porter draws from a rich palette of sonorities found within his imagination and the depths of the piano. Lynn Darroch of The Oregonian states, “Porter has built a reputation as a musician’s musician, a knowledgeable, inventive, and sophisticated player with a remarkable sense of time and gorgeous keyboard facility…”

Randy Porter has performed with many jazz greats, including Freddy Hubbard, Art Farmer, and Benny Golson. He has also performed with the Charles McPherson Quartet throughout the US and in France, Italy, Greece, and China. The Charles McPherson Quartet has re-created the music from the classic recording Charlie Parker with Strings, performing with many orchestras nationwide. Porter has also toured with Diane Schuur and Bobby Caldwell, conducting the Jazz Orchestra for their “Sing in Swing” tour.

Randy Porter has toured Europe with bassist David Friesen and has performed on several recordings with Friesen. Friesen’s 2001 Trio CD, Name of a Woman, received 4 stars from Downbeat in June of 2002 and featured Porter as pianist and composer. Porter has also recorded, performed, and toured worldwide with singer Gino Vannelli; Porter’s pianistic contributions can be heard on Vannelli’s CD’s, Yonder Tree, Slow Love and Canto.

Musical highlights include performing at Kimball’s with Art Farmer and Clifford Jordan, Lincoln Center and Kennedy Center with Diane Schuur, Seattle’s Jazz Alley with New York Voices, Yoshi’s in San Francisco with Karrin Allyson and Rebecca Kilgore, The House of Blues in Chicago and BB King’s Blues Club in NYC with Gino Vannelli, the Monterey Jazz Festival with Madeline Eastman, the Chicago and Detroit Jazz Festivals with Charles McPherson.

Porter’s compositions and arrangements can be heard on his own recordings: Thirsty Soul, with John Wiitala on bass and Reinhardt Melz and Todd Strait on drums; Brio, also featuring John Wiitala and Reinhardt Melz; Modern Reflections with Nancy King on vocals, Leroy Vinnegar on bass and Mel Brown on drums; and Eight Little Feet with Bob Magnusson on bass and Joe LaBarbera on drums. Samples of Porter’s writing and playing can be found on Apple’s iLife jingles. Porter also composed the music for the 2009 documentary, Deep Green.

Porter has been a performer and educator at the Port Townsend Jazz Festival for many years where he has coached many young jazz musicians. He has also worked several years at the Stanford Jazz Workshop and Jazz Camp West with singer Madeline Eastman.

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5
Album Review

The Barry Deister Quintet: Music for Jazz Quintet & Strings

Read "Music for Jazz Quintet & Strings" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci


Some music really does speak to the soul, inadvertently, but effectively, nonetheless. And there are painters, real painters, of whom Barry Deister is one. And so are the musicians who accompany him on this truly beautiful set of compositions. Since these are difficult times, there are days when everything seems to be an effort. It is beyond reassuring to play something that is somehow edgy, but in a calm way, and not contrived, but deep and searching. “Music for Jazz ...

6
Album Review

Rebecca Kilgore: The Rebecca Kilgore Trio, Vol. 1

Read "The Rebecca Kilgore Trio, Vol. 1" reviewed by Richard J Salvucci


What do “Doxy," “Cottontail," “Dear Bix" and “I Wanna Get Married" all have in common? Clues to a party game on some lost episode of Playboy After Dark? Give up? All make an appearance on Rebecca Kilgore's “swing and have fun" release, which is just what Kilgore and her co-conspirators (including her husband, Dick Titterington, on cornet) accomplish. Eclectic is the word for this marvelous compilation, whose composers run from Rube Bloom to Richard Rodgers.. But that's good. Putting the ...

3
Album Review

Barry Deister Quintet: Crows - The Portland Images Project

Read "Crows - The Portland Images Project" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Crows, a new recording by saxophonist Barry Deister's quintet, embodies a series of tone poems designed to depict in musical terms various features of the area in and around Portland, Oregon--a locale that Deister and his colleagues call home--as part of the Portland Images Project. Their themes range from ephemeral ("Winter Wind," “Fog," “Cascade Sunrise") to material ("Yellow Flower," “The Falls," “Crows") with one ("Burnside Blues") depicting a street that traverses the length of the city and theoretically splits it ...

8
Album Review

Charles McPherson: Jazz Dance Suites

Read "Jazz Dance Suites" reviewed by Jerome Wilson


Alto saxophonist Charles McPherson has a reputation as one of the last true followers of the bebop tradition but this release shows that his talents stretch beyond that. The music consists of scores he wrote for the San Diego Ballet where his daughter Camille is a solo dancer. It encompasses two full suites and an excerpt from another. “Song Of Songs" is a set of compositions based on impressions about love drawn from the Song Of Solomon. The ...

3
Album Review

Randy Porter Trio: Porter Plays Frishberg: Unsung

Read "Porter Plays Frishberg: Unsung" reviewed by Paul Rauch


Pianist/composer/lyricist Dave Frishberg may not be a household name in the world of jazz, but those in the know, musicians and listeners alike, appreciate the often whimsical artist. His works are associated with an “A" list of vocalists, including Blossom Dearie, Rosemary Clooney, Anita O'Day, Shirley Horn and Diana Krall. The 87-year old Frishberg now resides near Portland, Oregon after years in New York, Los Angeles and on the road. Frishberg's presence in the Rose City is the ...

6
Album Review

Cindy Scott: Historia

Read "Historia" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey


Stating the obvious right off, vocalist Cindy Scott is from New Orleans. This fact thoroughly and three-dimensionally informs the twelve selections on Historia, Scott's follow-up to Let The Devil Take Tomorrow (Catahoula Records, 2009), without making a burden of it. In subtle and not-so-subtle ways, the aural aroma of the Crescent City appears like an essence, that hyperdistillation that leaves neither finger nor footprint but exists as an indelible mark on the music readily recognised. This mark is made audible ...

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1

Recording

Renowned Vocalist Rebecca Kilgore Releases 'The Rebecca Kilgore Trio, Vol. 1' Featuring Randy Porter, Tom Wakeling

Renowned Vocalist Rebecca Kilgore Releases 'The Rebecca Kilgore Trio, Vol. 1' Featuring Randy Porter, Tom Wakeling

Source: Mouthpiece Music

Jazz vocalist Rebecca Kilgore is one the most prolific recording and performing artists on the scene today. With 50 or so recording projects as a leader or co-leader, she is one of the most respected interpreters of the Great American Songbook. Based in jny: Portland, OR, Kilgore has worked with many of the top jazz musicians in the Pacific Northwest and beyond. Kilgore does not disappoint on her newest recording, The Rebecca Kilgore Trio – Vol. 1, which features pianist ...

“. . . Porter’s superb technical facility allows him to weave tricky meters and clever cross-rhythms into a spirited, organic whole that emerges simply as beautiful music. “ – Lynn Darroch, The Oregonian

“…Randy Porter, an exceptional pianist whose grace and grit should win him many new friends. Listen!” –Chuck Berg

“(Randy Porter is). . . possessed of a fabulous technical command of his instrument, which in his case manifests itself not so much in rapid and glitzy runs as in subtler pianistic virtues: gorgeous touch, remarkable independence of left and right hands, and seemingly effortless execution of his harmonically rich musical outpourings.” –Glen Good

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Primary Instrument

Piano

Location

Portland

Willing to teach

Advanced only

Credentials/Background

Randy has adjudicated, taught master classes, and been a featured performer in college festivals, clinics, and summer workshops throughout the nation, including the Stanford Jazz Workshop, the Port Townsend Jazz Workshop, Jazz Camp West, Reno Jazz Festival and others. Porter has taught jazz piano, arranging and improvisation classes at University of Nevada, Reno,96-98, University of Oregon 2000-2001, and jazz history at Lewis and Clark College 2003-2004

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Photos

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Crows - The Portland...

Trans-Pacific Jazz
2021

buy

The Rebecca Kilgore...

Heavywood Records
2021

buy

Music for Jazz...

Trans Pacific Jazz
2021

buy

Porter Plays...

Heavywood Records
2020

buy

Jazz Dance Suites

Chazz Mack Music
2020

buy

Historia

STEM
2014

buy

Videos

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