HCC Jazz Festival
Jazz pianist Luis Perdomo featured artist for 25th anniversary festival
Hot off a win for Best Latin Jazz Album at the 66th annual Grammy Awards, pianist, composer, and band leader Luis Perdomo will be the featured guest artist at the 25th anniversary Holyoke Community College Jazz Festival, Fri., March 1.
The festival opens on Fri., March 1, with an 8 p.m. concert with Perdomo performing with the Amherst Jazz Orchestra under the direction of David Sporny on the stage of the Leslie Phillips Theater in the HCC Fine & Performing Arts building.
The concert is free for HCC students, faculty and staff, and $10 for the general public.
"Luis is a great musician, a great teacher, and a great guy," said festival organizer and HCC music professor Bob Ferrier. "I know him from the Jazz in July program at UMass, where we teach together. He just won a Grammy for the number one Latin Jazz Album, so that's special. We're very happy to have him here at HCC for our 25th anniversary festival."
In addition to his work as a performer, Perdomo is a composer, bandleader, and teacher. He began performing in his native Venezuela as a teenager and now makes his home in New York City. He is also an associate professor of music at Berklee in Boston. A prolific sideman, he has appeared on more than 200 records, playing with the likes of artists such as David Sanchez and David Gilmore as well as recording seven albums as a bandleader. He was a member of Ravi Coltrane's Quartet for 10 years and is a founding member of the Miguel Zenon Quartet.
This year, Perdomo and Zenon, a Puerto Rican saxophone player, received the Grammy award for Best Latin Jazz Album for their 2023 release, El Arte del Bolero Vol. 2.
The Amherst Jazz Orchestra, led by trombonist David Sporny, has been a mainstay of the HCC Jazz Festival since the first one in 1998. The HCC Jazz Festival has been held every except for 2020 and 2021 when it was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
PHOTO: Luis Perdomo
