Jazz Roots A Celebration of Brubeck

A Celebration of Brubeck featuring the Brubeck Brothers Quartet
With the Frost Concert Jazz Band
and special guests Catherine Russell and Tom Scott

2020 marked the centennial year of jazz giant Dave Brubeck. To celebrate his life and legacy, Dave's sons Chris and Dan Brubeck, who performed and recorded with their father beginning in the 1970s, curated a multimedia show with their own Brubeck Brothers Quartet. With Dan and Chris as the foundation, guitarist Mike DeMicco and pianist Chuck Lamb complete this dynamic quartet. Through stories told by Dave's sons and music performed by the quartet, the show invites audiences to travel along the timeline of the musician's extraordinary life and career.

Chris and Dan Brubeck have been making music together practically all their lives. Drummer Dan and bassist, trombonist and composer Chris cut their first record together in 1966. They’ve subsequently played a variety of styles in a number of groups, performing at concert series, colleges and jazz festivals across North America and Europe, including the Newport, Detroit, Montreal, Playboy/Hollywood Bowl and Monterey jazz festivals.

The quartet's most recent album, 2018’s TimeLine, celebrated Dave Brubeck's famous 1958 State Department tour. The album received extensive airplay in major jazz markets across America and was a hit on the Jazz Week radio charts for five months. It garnered dozens of stellar reviews, among them Dr. Judith Schlesinger’s review in AllAboutJazz. “An exciting ride. These are magnificent players whose years together have forged a seasoned and well-oiled musical unit,” Schlesinger wrote. “Their joy in this playing, and each other, is audible. Apart from its historic value — this is an exciting and varied outing, recorded crisply and with great warmth. The ‘Timeline’ it reflects is not just in years, but also in a legacy which — lucky for all of us — continues its powerful forward movement today.”

These versatile musicians collaborate with orchestras across the United States as well as internationally, including the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Russian National Symphony Orchestra and the Singapore Chinese Orchestra. In honor of Dave’s centennial, the quartet is concentrating on his compositions with orchestral arrangements by Chris.

Although the quartet’s style is rooted in straight-ahead jazz, their concerts reveal an inherent ability to explore and play odd time signatures while naturally integrating the influences of funk, blues and world music. The group’s creativity, technique and improvisation can be heard in their uncompromising music, which reflects their dedication to melody, rhythm, culture and the spontaneous spirit of jazz.

The quartet will be joined by special guests Tom Scott, Catherine Russell and the Frost Concert Band.