TICKETS are $10 General/$5 Student. End time is estimate.

Concerts and events made possible, in part, with support from the Wells Philanthropic Services provided by grants from the John, Anna, and Martha Jane Fields Memorial Trust Foundation, Stanley A. and Flora P. Clark Memorial Community Trust Foundation, and the Florence V. Carroll Charitable Trust, The Esther and George Jaruga Charitable Foundation, the Community Foundation of St. Joseph County's ArtsEverywhere initiative, and the Arts Project Support Grant and Arts Recovery Grant through the Indiana Arts Commission. Concert support provided by the Arts Midwest Grow, Invest, Gather (GIG) Fund grant (2022-2023 season).

A graduate of Loyola University New Orleans (BM Jazz, Minor in Philosophy), and Northwestern University (MM Jazz), Gustavo Cortiñas has developed a successful career in the US for over a decade, leading and accompanying ensembles in renowned stages and festivals in North America, Latin America, Asia, and Europe. “Cortiñas' music is uplifting, robust, melodic, and gets your body moving; it's an exciting blend of the artist's musical influences from jazz and Latin America, including his native Mexico" (DOWNBEAT). On this occasion, Gustavo is comes to Merriman's Playhouse to present his fourth record  as a leader: Kind Regards, which features original songs composed of both lyrics and music by Cortiñas, which attempt to bridge gaps and community in today’s polarized world. The subject matter on Kind Regards focuses on the immigrant experience in the US...  gives life, through music, to words that attempt to build bridges and understanding in times of borders and ignorance.

Gustavo Cortiñas - drums

Emily Kuhn - trumpet

Meghan Stagl - piano and voice

Katie Ernst - bass

Erik Skov - guitar

LISTEN: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSvCa5akVUw

Meghan Stagl has been pursuing music since she was little, and thinking about it pretty much nonstop since her first piano lesson when she was 6. She grew up in the northern suburbs of Chicago, where, after grade school piano lessons, she participated in her high school orchestra and choir, and directed the student-led a cappella ensemble her senior year. In college, Meghan became interested in jazz, studying piano and voice with Steve Talaga, Edye Evans Hyde, Dr. Brian Coyle, and Dr. Robert Hodson. In recognition of her participation and leadership in numerous jazz ensembles, she received the Jazz Jury Award and the Senior Jazz Award, along with the Music Senior Seminar Award for her capstone research project (using various music theory techniques to analyze a Coldplay album). She then attended Western Michigan University, for her M.M. in Jazz Performance. While there, she participated in the Downbeat-Award winning ensemble Gold Company along with numerous other groups, and has had the distinct pleasure of singing and studying with artists such as Peter Eldridge, Andrew Rathbun, Greg Jasperse, Keith Hall and Matthew Fries. Meghan also studied with legends like Sunny Wilkinson, Tammy McCann, and Jeremy Siskind. These days, she performs in the Chicago area with various jazz ensembles, including her duo project with bassist Matthew Epperson, the Sam Pilnick Project, and Gustavo Cortiñas’ Kind Regards Project. Recently, she won the 2020 Luminarts Fellowship for Jazz Voice. She's currently working on her first songwriter album, as well as continuing to record and play jazz all over the Chicago area!

Emily Kuhn is a jazz trumpet player based in Chicago, IL, described by the Chicago Jazz Magazine as having “a charismatic style and a sophistication that belies her youth.” Originally from Charlottesville, VA, Emily has made a name for herself as an active bandleader, sidewoman, composer, and educator since moving to Chicago in 2016. She released her debut album, Sky Stories, via BACE Records on October 30, 2020, to numerous accolades. She was named a Luminarts Fellow in Jazz in 2020, and received a nomination for “Best Jazz Musician” in the Chicago Reader’s 2020 end-of-year poll. Emily’s nine-piece chamber jazz ensemble, Helios, features a string quartet in lieu of a single chordal instrument and incorporates sounds from folk, popular, and classical musical traditions. Outside of this band, Emily plays regularly with a wide variety of ensembles across the jazz and Latin scenes in Chicago, including Latin fusion band Son Monarcas, Kitt Lyles’ Real Talk Collective, Gustavo Cortiñas’ Kind Regards, Sam Pilnick’s Nonet Project, Erik Skov’s Liminality, John Dorhauer’s Heisenberg Uncertainty Players, and Thaddeus Tukes’ Chicago Freedom Ensemble. She is the band program director for MUSIC Inc., which provides music programming for students on the West Side of Chicago, and has taught throughout Chicago and nationwide through the Chicago Jazz Philharmonic, Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras, and Stanford Jazz Workshop. Emily has a BM and BA in Jazz Trumpet Performance and Environmental Studies from Oberlin, where she took part in the Double Degree program. She has studied with renowned trumpet players Eddie Henderson, Sean Jones, John D’earth, and John Henes.

Bassist/vocalist Katie Ernst is described by the Chicago Tribune as "a versatile young bassist who plays in far-flung bands and sings with uncommon delicacy and authenticity." She is co-leader of the adventurous Chicago-based jazz trio Twin Talk and has received widespread critical acclaim for her Dorothy Parker poetry song cycle Little Words, which premiered at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC in 2015. Some recent notable performances and awards include performing in Mexico City, MX for a Chicago/CDMX Improvised Music Exchange in 2020; multiple performances at the Hyde Park Jazz Festival and Chicago Jazz Festival; performing with MacArthur Fellow and renown pianist/composer Jason Moran at the Chicago Symphony Center and the Kennedy Center; receiving a composing residency at the Ragdale Foundation; representing the USA as bassist and vocalist for the 2018 EuroRadio Jazz Orchestra in Riga, Latvia; and being named a Luminarts Fellow in Jazz in 2013. Katie is an active sidewoman in the jazz and improvised music communities of Chicago, and travels throughout the US as a guest artist/clinician for young musicians. She is the director of the jazz ensemble at Wheaton College and teaches at Birch Creek Music Academy for the Jazz I summer program. Katie holds a Bachelor of Music in Jazz Studies & Contemporary Media and a Bachelor of Musical Arts from the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY.

Erik Skov is a jazz guitarist, educator, and composer working in the Chicago area. As a graduate of North Central College (BA in Jazz Studies, minor in Anthropology, 2011) and Northwestern University (M.M. in Jazz Studies, 2015), Skov has established himself as an up and coming new voice for jazz guitar. An experienced performer on guitar, as well as banjo, Skov has been able to work professionally with top musicians