[ARCHIVE] Berklee meets Newpark! February 13

Two of Boston’s finest musicians – the master guitarist Rick Peckham, and Boston drumming legend Bob Gullotti – meet two of Ireland’s most renowned jazz performers, as two faculty members of the world’s most famous music school join forces with two from Ireland’s premier jazz institution. Rick, Ronan and Michael have a long history of performing together, but this is the first time to Ireland for the great Bob Gullotti whose swinging and incendiary playing will combine with the virtuosity of the others to ensure that this is a Transatlantic meeting that will live long in the memory!

The early 6 pm start is to facilitate a Limerick Jazz Workshop master class which is also open to the public.  The concert will start at 8.30.

Bob Gullotti is an experienced performer and teacher with a highly successful background as a professional musician, gaining acclaim both in the U.S. and abroad for unique creativity interpretive technique, and technical performance quality. His experience includes tours of Europe, South America, Australia, Canada, the Middle East, and the United States with his own band and with such well-known artists as Gary Bartz and Eddie Henderson. Bob has performed with such jazz notables as J.J. Johnson, John Abercrombie, George Mraz, Joe Lovano, Kenny Werner, Eddie Gomez, Tom Harrell, Mike Mainieri, Mose Allison, John Medeski, John Patitucci, Bob Brookmeyer, and Miroslav Vitous. Bob performed with the rock group Phish. His band, The Fringe, is a four-time recipient of the Boston Music Awards #1 Jazz Act Award. He has over fifty recordings to his credit and currently his band has a multi-record release contract with Soul Note Records, one of the top jazz labels in the world.

Rick Peckham is an internationally acclaimed guitarist, clinician, teacher, composer and writer. In addition to extensive work in the US, he has led or played on tours of Ireland, Canada, Spain and Germany. He has toured and recorded as a member of Irish bassist-composer Ronan Guilfoyle’s first incarnation of his cross-cultural Lingua Franca band, and has been featured on recordings by Human Feel, Hal Crook’s Um (with John Medeski), and the George Garzone Quartet. His trio recording Left End , with drummer Jim Black and bassist Tony Scherr was named one of the best releases of 2005 by DownBeat Magazine.

Peckham has been a faculty member at Berklee College of Music since 1986, serving as Assistant Chair of the Guitar Department since 1992. He organized the college’s honorary doctoral performances for Roy Haynes, Joe Zawinul, Jack DeJohnette and John Scofield. His Berklee Media works include the DVD Modal Voicing Techniques and two online courses: Guitar Chords 101 (2007 UCEA award for best online class) and Guitar Chords 201 at berkleemusic.com . In 2010, he worked as a design consultant for the guitar component of the Harmonix videogame Rockband 3. In addition to his private lesson studio at Berklee, Rick teaches a course dedicated to fingerstyle guitarist/composer Jerry Reed. He lives outside of Boston, Massachusetts with with his wife and two teenage sons.

Michael Buckley is regarded as one of the most important and influential musicians on the Irish jazz scene, and the saxophonist / flautist and composer has been playing professionally since the age of six when critics hailed him as a child prodigy. Born in Dublin city in 1971 Michael first came to prominence on an International level when, aged 10, he played flute with the legendary saxophonist George Coleman in the National Concert Hall. Though largely self-taught, his obvious talent has beendeveloped by his father Dick Buckley, and such legends as Milt Hinton. Buckley has found his ownunique voice playing both on saxophone and flute.

The last two years alone 2012 Buckley has been collaborating with the world jazz Orchestra where michael was representing Ireland, also the Edinburgh jazz festival Orchestra (led by Tim Hagans) also small group tours and concerts with Dave Liebman , John Abercrombie, Joey Baron , Jason Rebello,Nils Wolgram , Tom Rainey , Chander Sardjoe , to name but a few.

Now in his early 40s, Buckley is rapidly becoming the most important producer of his generation, with countless albums from jazz to traditional to hip hop Michael is making a name for him self internationally as a producer and engineer.

Buckley has also performed and toured in recent years with The Mingus Big Band, Jason Moran, Kurt Rosenwinkle, Edward Simon, Pete King, Badal Roy, Kenny Wheeler, Lee Konitz, Grant Stewart, Ingrid Jensen, Guy Barker, Greg Burk, Damon Brown, Kevin Dean, Florian Ross, soloist with the BBC big band, Albert Sanz, and Gerard Presencer among others. As well as frequent radio spots, Michael has made numerous television appearances, regularly works on film and television scores and recently collaborated on recordings with Donovan, the Cranberrys, The Coors,Jerry Lee Louis, Johnny Mattis ,also This year michael has been playing and touring with Glen Hansard as Michael is also renowned as the top session player and arranger in his field.

Ronan Guilfoyle is a major figure on the Irish jazz scene and has developed an international reputation as a performer, teacher and composer. He began his career with Louis Stewart’s group in the early 1980’s and studied at the Banff Centre for the Arts in 1986 and 1987 where his teachers included John Abercrombie, Dave Holland, and Steve Coleman. Performing on the acoustic bass guitar since the early 1980s, Ronan is now one of the instrument’s leading exponents, and is now much in demand as a bassist, both in his native Ireland and on the international jazz scene. Among the people he has performed with are Dave Liebman, Kenny Werner, Joe Lovano, Kenny Wheeler, Keith Copeland, Brad Mehldau, John Abercrombie, Larry Coryell, Benny Golson, Jim McNeely, Sonny Fortune, Andrea Keller, Andy Laster, Emily Remler, Simon Nabatov, Richie Beirach, and Tom Rainey. He has also been leading his own groups since the mid 1980s, and his groups have toured extensively in Europe, Asia, and North America. He has recorded extensively both as a sideman and as a leader and his output includes the award winning “Devsirme” in 1997.

Ronan has been composing for classical ensembles since 1993, specialising in compositions which feature both improvised and written music. He has had great success in this field and has now a large body of work that ranges from solo piano pieces, to chamber works, to orchestral compositions. He has had commissions from a wide range of ensembles and organisations including the RTE Concert Orchestra in Dublin, The Opus 20 String Orchestra in London, and the European Jazz Youth Orchestra. He has also been commissioned to write works for many great soloists including the saxophonist David Liebman, the violinist Michael D’arcy and the virtuoso accordionist Dermot Dunne. Ronan has also acquired a formidable reputation as a composer in the world of contemporary jazz, and his music has been performed by such jazz luminaries as Dave Liebman, Kenny Werner, Kenny Wheeler, Keith Copeland, John Abercrombie, Andy Laster, Simon Nabatov, Richie Beirach, Tom Rainey, Julian Arguelles, Rick Peckham, and Sonny Fortune.

In 1997 he won the Julius Hemphill Jazz Composition Competition in the United States.

Over the past 10 years Ronan has become very well known for the teaching of advanced rhythmic techniques for jazz improvisation and his book, “Creative Rhythmic Concepts for Jazz Improvisation” which covers such areas as metric modulation and odd metre playing, is now seen as the standard text for this area. He has been invited to teach this subject at many schools around the world including Berklee College of Music, The New School, and is an associate Artist of the Royal Academy of Music in London, and has also lectured on it for the International Music Congress (UNESCO) in Copenhagen. Ronan is the founder of and head of the jazz department at Newpark Music Centre in Dublin, the only school offering post-secondary jazz education in Ireland.