Sounds Of Berklee

By Rob Hochschild | September 5, 2012 Matt Savage, a 20-year old jazz pianist, composer, and arranger, entered Berklee in the fall of 2009 at the age of 17, and will graduate in December 2012. He has studied with many eminent professors at Berklee, including JoAnne Brackeen, Terri Lyne Carrington, Hal Crook, Dave Samuels, Ray Santisi and Darren Barrett. Savage also tours as a solo artist and as the leader of the Matt Savage Trio. He has performed on Late Night with Conan O'Brien, Late Show with David Letterman, the Today Show and on NPR's Piano Jazz with Marian McPartland and All Things Considered. He has also played at the Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall and some of the most prestigious jazz clubs in America (including the Blue Note, Birdland and Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola at Lincoln Center). Matt's ninth and latest CD, Welcome Home, features Bobby Watson and Jeremy Pelt among others and is heard on jazz radio stations across the country. He leads the Berklee Monterey Sextet in performances at the 55th annual

By Adam Olenn | August 28, 2012 Latvian flutist Ilona Kudina '03 studied at the Latvian Academy of Music before coming to Berklee, and has since toured throughout North America and Europe. The founder and leader of the Amber flute quartet, her 2010 release Nothing but Illusion features fellow alumnus Vardan Ovespian, Berklee faculty member Greg Hopkins, Akili Jamal Haynes, and legendary drummer Billy Hart. Listen to Ilona Kudina's "Nine Ate."

By Rob Hochschild | July 20, 2012 Saxophonist Daniel Rotem studied at Israel's Thelma Yellin High School for Arts, Shtricker Conservatory, and Rimon School of Jazz and Contemporary Music before enrolling at Berklee in 2011. Rotem has performed with a long list of jazz stalwarts, including Dave Liebman, Reggie Workman, Lionel Loueke, George Garzone, Scott Colley, John Taylor, and Michael Blake. He was also a featured featured guest at a joint performance with India Arie and Israeli composer and vocalist Idan Raichel. Rotem performs as part of Berklee Summer in the City at the Regattabar Courtyard Series on July 23 and at Wakefield Library on August 2.

By Rob Hochschild | July 10, 2012 Raised in the United Kingdom and Canada, Wilsen (formerly known as Tamsin) describes her music as influenced by the "warm folk sounds of Joni Mitchell and Nick Drake, with a dash of Feist." The Brooklyn-based songwriter is preparing to release her first album, Sirens. Wilsen performs as part of Berklee Summer in the City at Passim on July 12 and at Kendall Square and the ICA on August 9.

By Adam Olenn | June 29, 2012 According to longtime Boston Globe music critic Steve Morse, 2011 alumna Shea Rose is "that rare artist who can bridge diverse styles such as soul, funk, rock, rap, and jazz—and bring her unique stamp to each." Rose has won awards ranging from R&B/Soul/Urban Contemporary Artist of the Year at the Boston Music Awards to the SESAC Performance Activity award, and was even featured on Terri Lyne Carrington's 2011 Grammy Award–winning jazz album The Mosaic Project. Rose was chosen by Queen Latifah to be the spokeswoman for CoverGirl's 2010 Ignite Your Persona campaign and in 2012 she won the Red Bull Soundstage fan-driven contest to perform as part of the Universal/Red Bull showcase at SXSW in Austin, Texas. Shea Rose will be performing live at Berklee Summer in the City on Wednesday, July 18, at 5:45 p.m. on Children's Wharf, 308 Congress Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts.

By Adam Renn Olenn | October 5, 2012 Berklee College of Music, Heavy Rotation Records, and Berkleemusic.com present their sixth annual CMJ Music Marathon showcase of alumni and student artists, Friday, October 19, at 92YTribeca. To learn more about the artists, click here. The showcase will feature artists in a wide range of genres, including acts like: Shea Rose, with "S on my Chest" Measure, with "I Want to Know You" "Fever Sweat," by Heavy Rotations Records band Red Oblivion Gina's Picture Show, with "Forget" "You Go On & On," by Golden Bloom Heavy Rotations Records band Bent Knee, with "Little Specks of Calcium" and "Ogunquit, Maine," by the Field Effect. The event includes free raffles for a chance to win a badge to attend next year's CMJ Music Marathon and merchandise giveaways from Heavy Rotation Records, Berklee's student-run record label. Berklee's all-ages showcase is free for CMJ badge holders and $10 for the general public. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. 92YTribeca is located at 200 Hudson Street,

By Rob Hochschild | June 25, 2012 One comes from a small town and the other from Los Angeles, but when Erin Casey and Chris Carlberg met at Berklee, they found common musical ground. Now the pair is writing, recording, and performing, with two free shows this summer as part of Berklee's Summer in the City series. Herego performs at the Prudential Center on July 3 and at Fox Point on August 19.

By Adam Olenn | June 21, 2012 The songs of performer and educator Laura Vecchione '00 have placed in the Top 5 of the AMA chart and Roots Music Report, been quoted by Marvel Comics, and featured on television shows like Saving Grace and The Glades. Her debut album Deeper Waters was quickly embraced by XM Radio, and her sophomore outing Girl in the Band was produced by multi-Grammy-winner Jim Scott. In the run-up to the 2008 U.S. presidential election, she heard an anecdote about the influence of gospel singer Mahalia Jackson on Martin Luther King's iconic "I Have a Dream Speech," and was inspired to write a song about the history of race relations in America, titled "Tell Them About the Dream." Photo by Brian Kaminski

By Rob Hochschild | June 11, 2012 Spanish pianist and composer Ariadna Castellanos, Berklee's first Spanish Presidential Scholar, has been playing flamenco in places where it is rarely heard, such us Washington D.C.'s Kennedy Center and the Monterey Jazz Festival. Born in Madrid, she studied classical music in London before attending Berklee. Castellanos has performed and toured with many flamenco's leading artists, such as Niño Josele, Jorge Pardo, Agustín "El Bola" Carbonel, and Jesús del Rosario. A New York resident, she recently took part in a tribute to the great flamenco guitarist Paco de Lucía and is working on her new album with legendary musician and producer Javier Limón. Castellanos, Limón, and several other flamenco talents perform in the Flamenco Soul tour, June 22–25, 2012, the product of a collaboration between Berklee's Mediterranean Music Institute and SPAIN Arts & Culture. This edition of Sounds of Berklee features a Castellanos original, "Tangos."

By Adam Olenn |May 31, 2012 It was a snowy evening in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, when 2011 alumna Maya de Vitry first played with guitarist Oliver Craven. De Vitry, an award-winning songwriter, had just returned from several months of itinerant fiddling in Europe. Craven had recently wrapped up a tour with Grammy-nominated artist Adrienne Young. Together, they found the sensitive bass playing of Charles Muench was the perfect anchor for their voices. The trio has just released their first record, Borderland, and is touring constantly through spring of 2013. At noon on June 7, 2012, they will perform in Cambridge's Kendall Square as part of the Berklee Summer Concert Series.

By Rob Hochschild | May 29, 2012 Student pianist Hamish Napier was raised in the Scottish Highlands and learned flute, whistles, and voice, in addition to his principal instrument. After earning multiple award nominations for young Scottish musicians and recording with some of the country's leading musicians, Napier enrolled at Berklee to pursue an interest in fusing traditional music with jazz. The American version of the Hamish Napier Band brings together some of Berklee's best jazz and bluegrass student musicians, and has played the Celtic Connections Festival, and the Glasgow International Jazz Festival. This summer it plays in July and August as part of Berklee's Summer in the City series. This edition of Sounds of Berklee features a Napier original, "Dr. Flute."

By Adam Olenn | May 17, 2012 Since 2002, singer-songwriter Mark DeRose has been building his fan base by gigging relentlessly up and down the Eastern seaboard, recording four albums both as the Ernest Goodlife Band and as Mark DeRose and the Way Home. Their most recent, Carolina Smile, was released in 2011. A musician and freelance graphic designer, this 2005 alumnus has played at clubs and colleges, opening for higher-education favorites like Blues Traveler, Michelle Branch, and Rusted Root. DeRose's song "All My Life" is both catchy and moving, and was penned in memory of his late father Martin, who passed away in 2002.

By Rob Hochschild | May 10, 2012 Berklee's Summer in the City series presents a slew of concerts—many of them free shows—around Boston and the United States each summer. It's a great way for people to hear Berklee students and alumni when they're not on campus. One of the summer 2012 performers is Mozambique-born guitarist Albino Mbie, a Berklee student who auditioned during a college visit to South Africa in 2008 and is now studying in Berklee's Global Jazz Institute. Mbie's Afro-jazz sound fuses musical rhythms and concepts from his home country with sounds from the United States and other countries.

By Adam Olenn | May 3, 2012 Originally from Seoul, South Korea, Hey Rim Jeon began playing piano at the age of four. An interest in jazz led to a scholarship at Berklee. She graduated summa cum laude in 2001, and became Berklee's first Korean faculty member in 2003. In addition to her international club tours, she has performed at Lincoln Center, the BeanTown Jazz Festival, and on the main stage of Korea's inaugural Jarasum International Jazz Festival. Negative Proof, her collaboration with Doan Trang, won the prestigious Golden Prize in Vietnam in 2007. Jeon has been a guest clinician at the New England Conservatory and the Seoul Jazz Academy in South Korea. Joining her on her albums are Dave Liebman, Terri Lyne Carrington, James Genus, and Richie Barshay.

By Rob Hochschild | February 3, 2014 A key reason that Berklee's YouTube channel reached 2 million views last week was a series of videos highlighting student performers. One of them captured an October 2013 performance led by student bassist, vocalist, and songwriter Alissia Benveniste and her band on an original funk tune, "Let It Out," in the Berk Recital Hall. Less than four months since its release, the video—featuring Benveniste at the front and accompanied by a well-choreographed collection of instrumentalists and vocalists—has been viewed about 220,000 times. Benveniste was born in 1991 in Geneva, Switzerland and grew up in Milan, Italy before moving to Boston at the age of 18 to study at Berklee, after earning a scholarship at the Berklee at Umbria Jazz Clinics. She has performed in a number of high-profile concerts on campus and off. Watch the Alissia Benveniste video and others on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggPooXtzUD0&feature=share&list=PLG0f76gvWfh94PY9JO4bcx7Kp2YdAfJZ8

By Rob Hochschild | April 30, 2012 Berklee's Music Production and Engineering Department annually releases a CD of the finest work recorded by students in the year gone by. Two about-to-graduate students played key roles in "Tonight I'm Gonna Change the World," a song written and sung by Apoena Frota, a second-year student from Rio de Janiero, Brazil. The two seniors are Pete Jacobs, an MP&E major who produced the track, and guitarist Andre Vasconcelos. While this podcast features Frota as a solo artist, he, Jacobs, and Vasconcelos are three of the members of Dirty Blind, a band that's been grabbing a lot of attention as it prepares to open for Jefferson Starship on an East Coast tour this summer. [Photo: From left, graduating seniors Andre Vasconcelos and Pete Jacobs]

By Adam Olenn | April 20, 2012 2003 alumnus BJ Block was working on a sequel to his album Glitterball when he met Vancouver vocalist Dawn Pemberton. A staple of the Vancouver music scene, Pemberton was initially slated to record some background vocals for Block's instrumentals. One writing session later, it was clear that these two musicians had found a powerful creative connection, and the project morphed into their 2010 release The Land of Make Believe. Initially approached as a children's album for grown-ups, The Land of Make Believe explores adult challenges through the eyes of a child. The album, which was nominated for Urban Album of the Year by the Western Canadian Music Awards, was released worldwide through a Creative Commons license. During its two weeks on file-sharing site Frostwire, The Land of Make Believe was downloaded over 240,000 times, and earned Block and Pemberton a global following that has fully funded their next album through Kickstarter.

By Rob Hochschild | April 17, 2012 Yoga Girls is an electronic dance music duo known for incorporating elements of yoga mantras into their heavy noise and electro sounds. Current Berklee student Lillia Betz and recent Berklee graduate Dione Tan are from France and Singapore, respectively, and their music is a merger of organic sampling and grimy, distorted synth sounds. They site their musical inspirations as Trentemøller, Simian Mobile Disco, Wolfgang Gartner, and artists on the Ed Banger Records label. Betz and Tan met in Cuba and discovered a common fascination with yoga's energetic qualities, and decided to explore the idea of conveying this through dance music. They'll perform on a conference-opening bill for Rethink Music with Karmin and Junior Boys. Other Rethink performers include GZA, the Lumineers, and Mayer Hawthorne. This episode of Sounds of Berklee features the Yoga Girls' "Downward Dog."

July 21, 2015 | By Curtis Killian Behind the Song "Counterfeit" with #BerkleeAlumni Jenn Bostic: "Counterfeit is a song of deceit, uncovering the true colors of someone or something that has misinterpreted the truth. Whether it be a lover or a negative voice in your mind, it’s wrapped in beautiful clothing, slowly pulling you into its lie. It’s important to silence those voices and follow your heart’s desire. "Watching this song come to life was an incredible experience. Lauren Christy and I wrote it during our first writing session at her home in Los Angeles. Two songs from the album were written that day, the other being Hurting Me, Hurting You. Every once in awhile there an indescribably synergy that happens in a cowrite, and the songs seem to write themselves. That was one of those days. Lauren’s brother Brandon Christy and Paul Wiltshire produced the track, and I’ll never forget the first time I listened to the rough mix, I had tears streaming down my face. They had truly exceeded all my expectations i

By Adam Olenn April 5, 2012 Photo by Phil Farnsworth 1990 alumna and Berklee staff member Renese King is a talented instrumentalist and arranger whose soulful and moving voice has been called "resplendent" by The Boston Globe and garnered her a Boston Music Award for Gospel Artist of the Year. King has toured with the Boston Pops, the Tanglewood Festival Chorus, and many other orchestras, and was a featured artist on the soundtrack to the Emmy award-winning film Freedom Riders, which was produced for National Public Television's American Experience.