LIBBY YORK QUARTET
Something cool: Singing & SWINGING Great American Songbook & Bossa Nova CLASSICs
Sunday, September 19th @ 7:30 PM
Kerrytown Concert House welcomes Chicago vocalist Libby York for her KCH debut! York has garnered praise for her subtle, relaxed and swinging song stylings featuring some of the most loved, and most obscure, of the Great American Songbook classics. A storyteller who swings, she brings with her a high-powered rhythm section: Randy Napoleon (guitar), Rodney Whitaker (bass), and Keith Hall (drums). This performance anticipates the quartet’s next stop – the recording studio – and will include some of the tunes they intend to lay down!
COVID-19 Safety Policy for Indoor Concerts
- Moving forward, all patrons and artists who wish to attend or present performances indoors at KCH must provide a valid, complete COVID-19 vaccination card OR proof of a negative COVID-19 test performed within the previous 72 hours prior to entry. Such proof must be presented at concert check-in, may be displayed on a smartphone OR presented as a physical copy, and must also be accompanied by a matching, valid ID for verification.**
- Additionally, according to current CDC recommendations, masks are required for audiences inside the House and can only be removed when seated with a beverage (when available). When performing, artists may wear a mask, or not, at their own discretion.
**Proof of vaccination exceptions will be made for children under 12 and people with a medical condition or closely held religious beliefs that prevent vaccination. These guests must provide proof of a negative COVID-19 test taken within the previous 72 hours prior to entry.
Vocalist Libby York has garnered raves from the international jazz press for her performances and recordings, Blue Gardenia, Sunday in New York, Here With You and her latest release Memoir. She has enchanted audiences at venues such as The Kitano, Waldorf Astoria and Metropolitan Room New York City, Green Mill, Jazz Showcase, Winter’s Jazz Club Chicago, venues in Los Angeles, the Netherlands, Vancouver BC and Cafe Laurent, Paris.
It’s rare for Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker contributor and author (Paris To The Moon, Through The Children’s Gate), to write liner notes. But he was so taken by York’s voice and style that he offered to write them for York’s Here With You. Gopnik enthuses: “…the miracle of jazz singing as good as this, is that a voice’s encounter with words manages not only to produce the emotion the songwriters put in but add another new emotion of the singer’s own. Cool jazz singers Anita O’Day, Chris Connor, June Christy and Julie London are subtle influences on York, but her voice is unique, with a rich, warm tone not often found. She mentions Rosemary Clooney’s comment “I’m a singer of fine songs who works with jazz musicians” as resonating with her approach. In live performance she is a true jazz singer who improvises with her phrasing and swings hard. “The in-the-moment interaction with my band members is such joy!”
Libby’s latest album Memoir demonstrates that she is an expressive vocalist who chooses to work with only the best: Warren Vache, cornet, Russell Malone, guitar, John DiMartino piano, Martin Wind, bass and Greg Sergo, drums. In a nod to the great Bing Crosby/ Bob Hope duets York teams with Vache on “Put it There, Pal” and a tender rendition of “Thanks For The Memory”, featuring guitarist Russell Malone. Her other recordings reveal her as an astute record producer, featuring the great Frank Wess on tenor sax, Renee Rosnes, piano, Todd Coolman bass, Billy Drummond, drums, and Howard Alden, guitar. They also demonstrate the timelessness of the songs that she chooses to record and her heartfelt storytelling.
Although York has been performing since 1980, her recording career did not come about overnight. Her early influences include singer/guitarist Frank D’Rone and the great June Christy’s “Something Cool” album. She left Chicago in the early 70s to major in political science at American University in Washington, DC and opened a restaurant, The Back Porch Cafe in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware in 1974, which is still thriving. She spent most of the 80s and early 90s in New York where she was featured vocalist with Swing Street, an eight-piece big band, and was coached by the great Abbey Lincoln. She currently spends her time in Chicago, New York, Paris, Key West and looks forward to California appearances in 2017.
In 1999, her debut album Blue Gardenia was released on the Southport label. This was followed in 2004 by her breakthrough recording Sunday in New York, a Blujazz release that boasted Renee Rosnes on piano and Count Basie alumni Frank Wess on tenor sax. The album received an abundance of rave reviews including 4 stars in DownBeat magazine. In JazzTimes, Christopher Loudon described Sunday in New York as “a delectable all-standards program” and praised York’s “tremendous Anita O’Day appeal” as well as her “bravura dexterity.” Jazz Review’s John Gilbert called York “a master vocalist with a deep well of talent at her disposal,” and in All About Jazz, Dr. Judith Schlesinger asserted: “York is relaxed, subtle, and infinitely tender, especially on the ballads… you can hear the smile in her voice.” Sunday in New York’s liner notes were by the renowned Chicago-based jazz critic and radio personality, Neil Tesser, who wrote: “York finds the complicated emotional center of a lyric and sets it out with disarming simplicity.” Libby’s recording career demonstrates that she a storyteller, singer, bandleader, record producer and label owner. “Sometimes,” York asserts, “being both the producer and the vocalist is very challenging, to say the least, but I like overseeing the sound, how we present these classic American Songbook gems. The music, and the audience, deserve no less.”
Known as a forward-thinking musician with a passion for the jazz tradition, guitarist Randy Napoleon is an Associate Professor at Michigan State University. He is currently touring as a leader after twenty years of road apprenticeship with some of the most celebrated musicians and groups of our time.
Napoleon cut his teeth touring with pianist Benny Green, The Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, Michael Bublé, and a thirteen year tenure with Freddy Cole. He has also performed with artists across the jazz spectrum such as Bill Charlap, Natalie Cole, Monty Alexander, Rodney Whitaker and John Pizzarelli.
Napoleon has performed or arranged on over seventy records. He arranged as well as performed on Freddy Cole’s seven most recent records including the Grammy-nominated releases, Freddy Cole Sings Mr. B and My Mood Is You. He performed on The Clayton Hamilton Orchestra: Live at MCG. Napoleon is featured on Bublé’s Grammy-nominated CD/DVD Caught in the Act.
Napoleon has played on The Tonight Show, Late Night With David Letterman, The View, The Today Show, and The Ellen DeGeneres show as well as TV shows in South America, Europe and Asia. He has performed across the globe at notable venues including Royal Albert Hall, The Sydney Opera House, The Hollywood Bowl, and Lincoln Center.
Guitarist George Benson calls Napoleon “sensational.” Detroit Free Press critic Mark Stryker says Napoleon “plays with a gentle, purring tone that makes you lean in close to hear its range of color and articulation.” Washington Post critic Mike Joyce praises his “exceptionally nimble finger-style technique.” Comparing him to Wes Montgomery, music critic Michael G. Nastos says, “he displays an even balance of swing, soul, and single-line or chord elements that mark an emerging voice dedicated to tradition and universally accessible jazz values.”
Napoleon has four records as a band leader with a fifth, Common Tones, released Oct 4, 2019 on the Detroit Music Factory label.
Rodney Whitaker, internationally renowned recording artist, innovator, composer, jazz bassist, university distinguished professor of jazz double bass, director of jazz studies, special assistant to the dean, is one of the leading innovative performers and educators of the jazz double bass in the United States and has toured the globe over the last 37 years with legendary artists. He is a member of the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, artistic director of Dr. Phillips Center Jazz Orchestra, Gathering Orchestra, East Lansing Summer Solstice Jazz Festival, and Michigan State University Professors of Jazz where he has built, with enormous support from MSU’s administration, partners, parents, and patrons one of the most distinguished jazz degree programs and performing faculty in The United States of America. Rodney is featured on 200+ recordings, from film to compact discs. It is through Jazz, he has found his home, his passion, and his life-long legacy of performance and mentorship.
Keith Hall has established himself as a passionate educator and joyful performer over the last 25 years. For 12 years, Keith spent much of his time touring worldwide and recording with Curtis Stigers. Hall has also performed with the likes of Betty Carter, Sir Roland Hanna, Michael Phillip Mossman, New York Voices, Janis Siegel, Terrell Stafford, Steve Wilson and many others. He continues to tour and record with his critically acclaimed NYC-based trio TRI-FI. Hall lived and worked in New York City for nine years performing in a multitude of musical contexts and was a regular sub on Broadway’s Lion King. He toured Europe in the American Music Abroad Program with the Latin-jazz quartet, Grupo Yanqui. Hall is Jazz Drum Set Professor at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo MI, where he holds his annual Summer Drum Intensive. He is the author Jazz Drums Now! Vol. 1 and Vol. 2, and the radio host for Jazz Currents on WMUK, the NPR affiliate in Kalamazoo, Mich. Hall is a clinician for Remo Drumheads, Yamaha Drums, Vic Firth Drumsticks, and Zildjian Cymbals
