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• Julius Rodriguez
  

  You can find Julius Rodriguez in many places. You could walk into a packed jazz haunt and bear witness to him behind the piano with energy practically surging from his fingers through the room. You might scroll up on social media and catch him alternating from drums to bass to guitar at the speed of a jump cut. You may also step onto festival grounds and see him on stage either solo or accompanying another likeminded visionary, jamming like his life depends on it. No matter where, the New York-born and Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist, composer, and producer electrifies any lane. By doing so, he also transcends perceived boundaries between genres and styles, redefining the music to mirror his own fluid creative inclinations and delivering a sound that’s solely his alone.

  Following widespread applause from The New York Times, Vanity Fair, The FADER, and more, collaborations with everyone from Wynton Marsalis to A$AP Rocky, and tens of millions of streams, he grows in as many directions as possible on his second full-length offering, EVERGREEN [Verve Records].

  “I kept seeing the word EVERGREEN everywhere,” he recalls. “I looked up the definition, and it struck me. An ‘EVERGREEN’ is a plant whose foliage remains functional for all seasons. That’s similar to how I like to be; I want to be myself no matter the genre I’m playing or what’s going on around me. There are a lot of styles on this record, but it’s recognizably my voice.”

  He’s honed that voice since his childhood in New York where he participated in his first late-night downtown jam session at barely eleven-years-old. Sharpening his skills with thousands of hours and hundreds of gigs, he established himself as a highly sought-after collaborator—whether on piano, drums, synths, or bass. You could hear him loud and clear on recordings by the likes of Carmen Lundy, Lackecia Benjamin, Brasstracks, Kassa Overall, Baby Rose, Joe Farnsworth, Cautious Clay, Ian Isiah, and Braxton Cook. Moreover, he has shined on stage with the late Roy Hargrove, Remi Wolf, Dev Hynes, Lauren Spencer-Smith, Macy Gray, Kurt Elling, Gabriel Garzón-Montano, Morgan James, and Cautious Clay, to name a few. He even lent his talents to Meshell Ndegeocello’s The Omnichord Real Book—which garnered the first-ever GRAMMY® Award in the category of “Best Alternative Jazz Album.”

  Julius’s signature style came to life on his solo debut, Let Sound Tell All. NPR hailed the latter as “a project so dynamic that even the umbrella of jazz couldn’t quite contain its essence,” and GRAMMY.com noted, “Rodriguez is demonstrating a lively, inspired talent within the genre’s convention while also infusing his own personal musical identity and history into the music.” Not to mention, he made his debut at North See Jazz festival in 2023, charging up the crowd.

  As life changed, his music evolved. Spending the bulk of his life in New York, he relocated to Los Angeles during 2022.  At this point, he had toured and performed around the globe. Moving away from home and seeing the world exerted a profound impact upon him. He notes, “You don’t understand how different these moments are until you experience them head-on.”

   At the top of 2024, he entered a studio in North Hollywood, CA with producer Tim Anderson [Solange, Halsey, Billie Eilish]. They unlocked a distinct chemistry, bonding over the catalog of Herbie Hancock and seventies fusion titans Mahavishnu Orchestra.

   “Tim has an appreciation for jazz and the culture, so he understood where I was coming from musically,” Julius goes on. “From there, he brought in other elements. I love what he’s done with artists outside of the tradition I come from like Solange and Banks, and he introduced me to the ambient music world.”

   Fittingly, Julius introduces the album with the opener and single “Mission Statement.” Steady handclaps set the track in motion as a spacey loop swims around a slick bass line. Cymbals chatter through vibrant piano, and a saxophone solo sails off towards the horizon.

  “‘Mission Statement’ was one of those ideas that initially came to me in the Pandemic,” he recalls. “I was figuring out how to incorporate sounds from hyperpop, drum ‘n’ bass, and other styles that I dig, but I don’t get a chance to play. In terms of the name, I’m not just trying be the jazz musician that everyone knew me as. My vision was to create a different sound that’s unique to my influence. My mission is to break out of what people know and expect of me and just do what I like.”

  “Love Everlasting” sees him team up with longtime friend and fellow dynamo Keyon Harold. A dreamy keyboard melody gently echoes as Keyon’s unmistakable trumpet booms in fits of emotion over robust drums and shimmering piano.

  “I’ve known Keyon since college,” he goes on. “He was the first person to take me on tour in Europe, and I’d always wanted to work with him on my own material. I invited him to the studio, and he played trumpet and harmonized with himself. Thematically, it felt like a cycle of what I assumed to be a friendship. In a strong friendship, no matter what happens, you’ll always understand the love you and the other person have for each other.”

  Then, there’s “Run To It (The CP Song).” It hinges on a boisterous back-and-forth between the bass, beats, guitar, and piano—akin to a vivacious Sunday on stage in a Southern church. “There’s a camaraderie to the melody,” he smiles. “It’s bound to make for a good time.”

   On the other end of the spectrum, he injects a “jazz waltz vibe” into his reimagining of Dijon’s “Many Times.” The epic “Stars Talk” unites him with Nate Mercereau whose synths and freestyled guitar samples amplify an exhale of sonic bliss. “It takes you on a bit of a journey,” he notes. “Nate brought it to another level.”

   The album crescendos to a triumphant inflection point on the closer “Champion’s Call” [feat. Georgia Anne Muldrow]. A signature piano line from Julius brims with energy as Georgia’s deep wail resounds with earthquaking intensity in a mantra-like motion, “Champions call.”

   “I played some shows with Georgia, and I asked, ‘What are we going to play?’,” he remembers. “She replied, ‘I don’t do setlists; we go on stage and just trust God’. She’s big on letting her spirit flow through her from a higher power. That’s exactly what she did on ‘Champion’s Call’. It was pretty magical.”

  By breaking boundaries with EVERGREEN, Julius has lived up to the true spirit of jazz by ushering it towards the future freely.

  “I hope you hear this and forget about the whole genre labeling thing,” he leaves off. “This is just music you can dance to, feel to, and think to. It’s not about categorizing; it’s about enjoying something for what it is. EVERGREEN goes through a whole bunch of genres, but this is the world I’m seeing and hearing. This is the feeling I’m invoking. I made a statement and said, ‘The genre is just me’.”

• Patricia Brennan Septet
  

  • Patricia Brennan - vibraphone
  • Jon Irabagon - alto and sopranino sax
  • Mark Shim - tenor sax
  • Michael Rodriguez - trumpet
  • Kim Cass - bass
  • Dan Weiss - drums
  • Mauricio Herrera - percussion
• Gonzalo Rubalcaba, Chris Potter, Eric Harland, Larry Grenadier
  

  • Gonzalo Rubalcaba - piano
  • Chris Potter - sax
  • Larry Grenadier - bass
  • Eric Harland - drums

  Sir Simon Rattle has called the Cuban jazz pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba… “the most gifted pianist on the planet” …

  Dizzy Gillespie’s remarks (1985) on first hearing Gonzalo …“thegreatest pianist I’ve heard in the last 10 years” …

  Charlie Haden once remarked…“Gonzalo is the master of musical structures, he is a smart heart” …

  Ben Ratliff, The New York Times …“Meticulous Jazzman of the World” “he has an almosteerie control over his sound, as if he were playing the strings directly instead of using the keys as intermediaries” …

  Howard Reich, Chicago Tribune … “Gonzalo Rubalcaba ranks among the most accomplished jazz pianists in the world today and perhaps stands at the top of that elite group, thanks to a colossal technique and an unfettered musical imagination” …

  Howard Reich, Chicago Tribune … “Rubalcaba’s pianism is something of a quasi-classical recital, Rubalcaba draws as much from his classic idioms as his jazz lexicon, eradicating barriers between the two, albeit in decidedly contemporary terms. Only a pianist with Rubalcaba’s footing in both classical and jazz orthodoxies could have pulled it off”

  Ferdinand Brau, Bösendorfer … “We consider ourselves fortunate to have Gonzalo Rubalcaba, one of the great pianists, musicians and virtuosos of Jazz, at our side as a Bösendorfer Artist. It is a great pleasure to be able to accompany the musical path of a great artist and performer with our instruments and thus be a part of it.”

  In 1999, the multi-Grammy® Winner, pianist, and composer Gonzalo Rubalcaba was selected by Piano & Keyboard Magazine as one of the great pianists of the 20th century, alongside figures such as Glenn Gould, Martha Argerich and Bill Evans. He has won three Grammys® and Four Latin Grammys, 21 Grammys nominations and he has been awarded the EMPIK Bestsellers prizes, “Palmarés”, awarded by the prestigious institution “Grand Prix De L’ACADEMIE DU JAZZ” and a “Les Victoires du Jazz”, all of which has established him as a creative force in the jazz world. In 2008 he was awarded the ASCAP Foundation “VANGUARD AWARD” for his work as a Composer and Pianist whose innovative and distinctive music is charting new directions in Jazz.

  Gonzalo was born on May 27, 1963,intoa musical family in Havana. His father, pianist, composer,and bandleader Guillermo Rubalcabahad also played in the orchestra of Enrique Jorrín, the creator of cha-cha-cha; his grandfather Jacobo Rubalcaba, was the composer of classic danzones, and his two brothers werealso musicians. Gonzalo, a child prodigy who by the age of 6 was playing drums in his father’s orchestra, started his formal training two years later. He chose the piano as his main instrument to, as he once recalled, “just to please my mother.” He graduated from the Institute of Fine Arts in Havana with a degree in composition and by his mid-teens he was working as both drummer and pianist in the hotels, concert halls and jazz clubs of Havana. Following graduation, he stepped right into the life of the popular musician, touring Cuba, Europe, Africa and Asia with the fabled Orquesta Aragón andas a sideman in jazz groups and, beginning in 1984, leading his own Afro-Cuban jazz rock fusion band, “Grupo Proyecto”

  The encounters with Gillespie and, in 1986, with Charlie Haden and then Blue Note Records president, Bruce Lundvall, set the stage to finally showcase Rubalcabás talent before jazz audiences in the United States. These years are documented in a series ofrecordings in Havana and Frankfurt, Germany, including three superb recordings with his Cuban Quartet on the German label Messidor: Mi Gran Pasión (1987), Live in Havana (1989) and Giraldilla (1990). Rubalcaba moved to the Dominican Republic in 1991 and settled in Miami in 1996.

  His international recording career, which includes titles such as Discovery –Live at Montreux, Images–Live at Mt. Fuji, The Blessing, Suite 4 y 20, Rapsodia, Diz and Imagine –Gonzalo Rubalcaba in the USA, has garnered him 18 nominations including threeGrammys and three Latin Grammys. He won Grammys for Nocturne (2001)andLand of the Sun (2004), two collections of Latin ballads and boleros recorded with bassist Charlie Haden and SKYLINE (2022), a reunion of old friends Ron Carter and Jack DeJohnette. He won Latin Grammys for Solo (2006), Supernova (2002), Live in Marciac(2022) with thesinger Aymée Nuviola, and Vida-Omara (2023) – Omara Portuondo Album as a producer.

  In 2010, Gonzalo founded 5Passion Records with the businessman Gary Galimidi, and sincethen, the label has not only released Rubalcaba’s latest recordings such as Fe (2011), XXI (2012), Volcan (2014), Live Faith (2015), the Latin Grammy nominated Suite Caminos (2015) and Charlie (2016), but also albumsby artists such as Will Vinson, Ignacio Berroa, Yosvany Terry and many more. In addition to “5PassionRecords”, Gonzalo joined the „Top Stop Music” record label family in 2020 to record/release the Grammy-nominated Viento y Tiempo live at Blue Note Tokyo with singer Aymée Nuviola. In 2020, his independent Record label 5Passion was restructured in partnership with the businessman Ariel López, and released the album SKYLINE (2021). The album won theGrammy® Award in the category of Best Jazz Instrumental Album (2022), with Rubalcababecomingthefirst Latin American musician to do so as a leader in the Best Instrumental Jazz Album category.

  Reflecting his interest in music education, Rubalcaba joined the faculty of the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music in 2015. In 2020, he founded his own academy (Rubalcademy), offering remote Masterclasses to musicians across the world. Another of his nominations was with singer, pop and soul music Jon Secada with the albumSOLOS was for the 2021 Latin Grammy® Awards, under the Oleta Music record label.

  In 2022, he won his last Latin Grammy for „Best Traditional Tropical Album” in the company of the incomparable singer Aymée Nuviola with the project Live in Marciacunder his Record label 5Passion. 2023 was awarded in the category of Album of the Year, with the prestigious French award „Les Victoires du Jazz” together with saxophonist Pierrick Pédron with the album PédronRubalcaba.In the current year 2024 he had the honor of being awarded by the prestigious Jazz Institution „Académe du Jazz” to receivetogether with Pierrick Pédon the „Palmarés” -„Album of the year 2023”–with the album Pédron Rubalcaba-„Grand Prix De L’ACADEMIE DU JAZZ 2023 „

  His latest discography production,Borrowed Roses–piano Solo, (released by therecord label “Top Stop Music”)hasbeen highly admired by specialized critics, selected as one of “The best jazzalbums of 2023”around the world. This virtuoso musician and considered one of the leading artists in Afro-Cuban jazz, has received worldwide acclaim from outlets such as the Wall Street Journal, NPR, Downbeat, the Chicago Tribune, and others.