Antoinette Montague Upcoming Performances:Sunday, February 11, 2007
5:00 pm (sharp) FREE!
Antoinette Montague with the Bill Easley Quartet with John DiMartino (piano), Santi Dibriano (bass) Rudy Petchauer (drums)
Jazz Vespers at St. Peters Church
619 Lexington Avenue (at 54t Street)
New York, NY 10022
212-935-2200
www.saintpeters.org
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
8:00 PM and 9:00 PM
Mike Longo's Trio
featuring Antoinette Montague
with Paul West (bass) and Ray Mosca (drums)
The John Birkes Gillespie Auditorium
Jazz @ NYC's Bah' Center
53 East 11th Street
New York. NY
212-222-5159
www.bahainyc.org
Tickets: $15 (doors open early)
“She has a powerful voice, the ability to hold long notes without wavering, and a knack for making every song sound bluesy. Antoinette Montague's delivery is heartfelt, infectious and memorable." --Scott Yanow, Los Angeles Jazz Scene
Born and raised in Newark, Antoinette Montague may have just released her first CD but she has had many invaluable musical experiences. She worked in gospel and r&b ensembles after college, serves as the vice president of the International Women in Jazz, and considers Carrie Smith, Etta Jones, Della Griffin and Myrna Lake to be her mentors. Antoinette has worked extensively in the New York area during the past decade with such musicians as Red Holloway, Benny Powell, Bill Easley, Winard Harper, Wycliffe Gordon, Frank Wess, the Duke Ellington Orchestra and Mike Longo's New York State of the Arts Orchestra.
Recording and releasing Pretty Blues on the Consolidated Artists label raised her profile and has given her fame beyond the East Coast. On this highly enjoyable CD, Antoinette Montague is featured belting out blues, interpreting sensitive ballads, combining together passion and sophistication, and making every song sound fresh, infectious and topical.
Collaborating with Masters: Bill Easley and Mike Longo
Bill Easley
Master reed player, band leader and renowned session player Bill Easley is joined by Antoinette Montague, a Jazz singer who electrifies audiences wherever she performs, for a swinging night of Jazz and Blues celebrating the release of Antoinette's debut CD, “Pretty Blues."
Bill Easley has had a diversified career, as a professional musician, spanning more than forty years. His arsenal of woodwind instruments includes; Tenor, Alto and Soprano Saxophones, Clarinet, and Bass Clarinet, Flute, Alto Flute and Piccolo. In recent years he has played in bands led by such notables as Ruth Brown, Jimmy Smith, Jimmy McGriff, Bobby Short, Louie Bellson, Nicholas Payton, Charles McPhearson, James Williams, Roland Hanna, Earl May, Illinois Jaquett, Ron Carter, Frank Foster, Mercer Ellington, Panama Fransis and Grady Tate among many others
Mike Longo
After 42 years as a New York-based jazz pianist with 17 albums under his own name and 22 years of performing with Dizzy Gillespie, Mike Longo started his musical career with piano lessons when he was three. At fifteen he began to play professionally, and while still a high school student in Ft. Lauderdale, he got the chance to play with Cannonball Adderley.
Mike Longo later worked with both Red Allen and Coleman Hawkins in New York. He next spent a year in Toronto where he studied with Oscar Peterson. But he perhaps best known for work with another Master of Jazz: Mike was the pianist and music director for Dizzy Gillespie from 1966 to 1973.
Mike Longo's CD releases include New York 78, Like a Thief in the Night, Dawn of a New Day. The Mike Longo Trio: Still Swinging and Live: The Detroit International Jazz Festival 2003. The New York State of the Arts Orchestra: Explosion and Oasis.
For more information contact All About Jazz.
