Berklee Press Release
Berklee
Press Release-August 22, 2006
Re-printed by Permission
August 22, 2006 -- The Berklee Monterey Quartet brings four of the legendary
Boston music college's finest current students to the Monterey Jazz Festival
for two afternoon sets on Sunday, September 17 that promise both joyous interplay
and youthful virtuosity.
The
first college to offer an education based on the aesthetic and
ethos of jazz, Boston’s Berklee College of Music is proud to bring
the tenth edition of the Berklee Monterey Quartet to perform on the
festival grounds. Each fall, the college chooses four of Berklee’s
finest students to perform at Monterey, and this year, for the first
time, a winner of the full-tuition Jimmy Lyons Scholarship to Berklee
returns to play the festival as a member of this carefully selected
group.
With
graduation still ahead, the members of the Quartet are already
highly sought after, with dozens of top-name professional credits,
major awards, and concerts. Co-leaders Lawrence Fields and Godwin
Louis are among the college’s most promising, upper-semester
students. Joining them is Seaside native, and Jimmy Lyons
Scholarship winner, James Williams, fresh off world tour with Gary
Burton’s Next Generation band.
Former members of the Quartet have gone on to perform and record with such artists as Terence Blanchard, Gary Burton, Mariah Carey, Ravi Coltrane, The Crusaders, Roy Hargrove, Roy Haynes, Patti LaBelle, Chuck Mangione, Manhattan Transfer, Ledisi, Mingus Big Band, Steps Ahead, John Scofield, and Steve Turre, to name a few.
The
Quartet’s performance at Monterey is accented each year when
they are joined onstage by one, supremely talented student musician
from California, the recipient of that year’s Jimmy Lyons
Scholarship to Berklee, the highly coveted, full-tuition award named
for the founder of the festival. The award will be presented to this
year’s winner on Sunday, at 2:00 pm, on the Jimmy Lyons Stage,
immediately following the performance of the Next Generation All-Star
Band.
The
group plays the festival twice on Sunday the 17th; from 2- 3:30
pm on the Garden Stage, and again, in the intimate Coffee House
Gallery, at 5 pm.
