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. Special concert event support provided by the Arts Midwest Grow, Invest, Gather (GIG) Fund grant (2022-2023 season).

The Keith Hall Trio, featuring Robert Hurst and Andrew Rathbun - Celebrating the record release of MADE IN KALAMAZOO - Duos and Trios

Andrew Rathbun - saxophones

Robert Hurst III - acoustic bass

Keith Hall - drums, cymbals, and percussion

Program to be selected from the following:

Keith Hall and Andrew Rathbun -  Boiling Pot

Keith Hall and Andrew Rathbun  - Douglass King Obama

Keith Hall and Andrew Rathbun  - The Promise

Keith Hall and Andrew Rathbun - Kzoo Brew

Keith Hall b - Be Curious (For Billy Hart)

Keith Hall  - Well of Hope

Keith Hall  - Coming of Age

Keith Hall  - Creative Force

Made in Kalamazoo (Trios and Duos) is a free-wheeling set of high-energy music that is a love letter of sorts to a place Hall appreciates for its vibrant arts community, dynamic industries and vital personal connections. The album documents the drummer’s most accomplished and compelling playing and writing to date.

Made in Kalamazoo finds Hall in a few different modalities with the players involved. There are three solo drum features — placed at beginning, middle and end — in which Hall pays homage to the towering role models Billy Hart, Elvin Jones, and Max Roach. There are seven tracks with the full trio, including three compelling Hall originals (“Coming of Age,” “Creative Force,” “Well of Hope”) and four tunes that the leader co-composed with Rathbun (“Douglass King Obama,” “Kzoo Brew,” “The Promise,” “Boiling Pot”). And there are 10 spontaneously composed duo tracks for drums and reeds, giving Rathbun creative space to “plug in” at times with signal processing, dirtying up the sound and leading the duo onto new and shifting terrain.

The joy these three players share in making music is evident on every note of the trio portion of Made in Kalamazoo. Their rapport is fueled by a supple in-the-pocket swing, with an essential balance of looseness and intricacy and ample room for the three virtuosos to stretch. On the duo portion, Hall and Rathbun access another side of their creativity, delving into what Hall calls “a fun experiment of various grooves, textures and sounds.” Results range from swinging acoustic jazz to wah-wah funk, spacey synth, and guitar-like riffing. Taken together, the trios, duos and solo drum moments of Made in Kalamazoo speak to the breadth and depth of Hall’s experience, the extraordinary level of communication and trust between him and his colleagues, and the regional inspiration of their Michigan home and all that it has given them.

Available at https://keithhall.bandcamp.com/and all streaming services.

http://keithhallmusic.com/

4 and 1/2 Stars!

“Hall keeps his cymbals dancing.” – DOWNBEAT Magazine

“Interesting to listen to from start to finish because it is perfectly mastered, inventive and imbued with an infectious joy.” – Culture Jazz, France

“The tracks are sublime: three solo drum pieces, seven trio gems and 10 duets of spontaneous composition. There’s funk, jamband synth, swing, post-bop, avant-garde and even what sounds like soundtrack music for a movie that doesn’t exist.” – Goldmine Magazine

“A varied and exciting record.” – Salt Peanuts, Norway

Keith Hall has established himself as a joyful performer and a passionate educator over the last 25 years and is the Professor of Jazz Drum Set at Western Michigan University. For 12 years, Keith spent much of his time touring worldwide and recording with singer and Concord Recording Artist Curtis Stigers. Hall has also performed with the likes of Betty Carter, Wycliffe Gordon, Sir Roland Hanna, Michael Phillip Mossman, New York Voices, Andrew Rathbun, Janis Siegel, Terrell Stafford, Joe Wilder, and Steve Wilson among others. He has recorded five albums with his critically acclaimed trio TRI-FI.

Hall lived and worked in New York City for nine years performing in a multitude of musical contexts. Although most of these were jazz, he was also a regular sub for Tommy Igoe on Broadway’s Lion King. Hall was a member of the Latin-jazz quartet, Grupo Yanqui, chosen by the United States State Department and Jazz at Lincoln Center to represent the U.S. in the American Music Abroad Program. Hall was also a member of the prestigious Betty Carter’s Jazz Ahead in 1997.

Hall is the Artistic Director of the Keith Hall Summer Drum Intensive, a one-of-a-kind jazz drum camp that celebrated its 16th year. He is also the Executive Director of TUNED IN, a nonprofit organization, which focuses on supporting the power of music education to change lives. Hall is the author of two instructional jazz drum set books: Jazz Drums Now! Vol. 1 and Jazz Drums Now! Vol. 2 and is the radio host for Jazz Currents on WMUK, the NPR affiliate in Kalamazoo, Michigan and hosts The Real Music Talk Podcast.

Hall presents clinics worldwide and is a proud endorser for Remo Drumheads, Yamaha Drums, Vic Firth Drumsticks, Zildjian Cymbals, Cympad, Big Fat Snare Drum, Cympad, Rhythm Tech, and Protection Racket Drum Cases.

A Detroit native, Robert Hurst III has enjoyed a stellar career spanning 30+ years, and is a highly respected and well recognized composer, electric and acoustic bassist, educator, recording artist, and businessman. His cultivation into a membership of talented musicians from around the world was fostered by lengthy tours and GRAMMY® Award winning recordings featuring: Sir Paul McCartney, Charles Lloyd, Wynton Marsalis, Branford Marsalis, Dave Brubeck, Harry Connick Jr., Terrence Blanchard, Tony Williams, Nicholas Payton, Sting, Carl Allen, the legendary Pharaoh Sanders, Barbara Streisand, Willie Nelson, Yo Yo Ma, Ravi Coltrane, Chris Botti and Diana Krall.

Robert Hurst has performed on over 250 diverse and critically acclaimed recordings. A select group of these productions has garnered him seven GRAMMY® Awards and several RIAA ® certified Multi-Platinum and Gold recordings, whilst his own eight recordings as a Bandleader have all generated Top Ten and Five Star recognition around the Globe. You may also recognize Robert as the inaugural bassist in the House Band of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno for eight seasons, from 1992 to 1999. His work in performing, directing, acting, arranging, and composing on the NBC program was highlighted with four EMMY® Awards in 1995, 1996, 1997 and 1999. Hurst has also penned original music scores for several films including The Wood and Brown Sugar. Hurst can be heard in over 30 major motion pictures and has featured solos and performances on BlockBuster soundtracks including Ocean’s Eleven, Twelve and Thirteen, Good Night, and Good Luck and No Sudden Move, 2021.

Hurst maintains a tenured position as an Associate Professor of Music at the University of Michigan’s School of Music, Theatre and Dance, Ann Arbor, Michigan. In 2021, Hurst was awarded an NEA Grant, and in 2022-2023 will release new music and present a series of original and diverse programming as the first Artist in Residence for Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit, Michigan.

Saxophonist, composer, bandleader, and Toronto native Andrew Rathbun has achieved a rare depth of lyricism, authoritative swing and compositional intelligence in nearly 20 years as a recording artist. His work is rooted in modern jazz but also deeply informed by classical composition — his recordings have included adaptations of Ravel, Mompou and Glück, among others. He has written big band commissions for the Danish Radio Jazz Orchestra, the Brussels Jazz Orchestra, the Metropole Orkest and other ensembles, and performed and composed commercial music for roughly 10 years as well. Another of Rathbun’s inspirations is poetry: his recordings Jade and True Stories set to music the verse of Cathy Song and Margaret Atwood, respectively (both albums featured acclaimed Brazilian vocalist Luciana Souza). His 2002 release, Sculptures featured trumpet legend and Toronto native Kenny Wheeler in a set that “cloak[s] subtle avant-garde proclivities in soft light and open air” (JazzTimes). Rathbun has also tackled political subjects with his large-ensemble work “Power Politics Suite” and his 2007 quintet session Affairs of State. His other recordings of note are Renderings (duo with pianist George Colligan), Days Before and After (co-led with drummer Owen Howard), Shadow Forms (featuring George Garzone), Where We Are Now (featuring Billy Hart), The Idea of North and Numbers & Letters. Rathbun earned a Master’s in Performance from Boston’s New England Conservatory, where he studied with George Garzone, Jimmy Giuffre and George Russell. He became a fixture on the New York jazz scene during his years in Brooklyn, helping to shape the sound of the music in the new millennium as he earned a Doctorate in Jazz Arts from Manhattan School of Music. He is currently Professor of Saxophone and Jazz Studies at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, where he lives with his family. He continues to perform in New York and internationally.