Frank Catalano to Play the Iridium, 8/10 & 15

Frank Catalano will be appearing at The Iridium tonight, Aug. 10 and Aug. 15, with shows at 8pm and 10pm. (Aug 10th featuring Randy Brecker; Aug 15th featuring Vuc Juris). The Iridium is located at 1650 Broadway in NYC.

Frank Catalano & Randy Brecker Band
08/10 8:00 PM & 10:00 PM - $25.00
Buy tickets to the 8:00pm show or 10:00pm show

Frank Catalano makes his Savoy label debut with "Bang!" Bang! debuted at #12 on the Billboard Jazz Charts. Frank's previous CD, "Mighty Burner" was on the Billboard Charts for 20 straight weeks. Catalano is the only known saxman to have performed with Miles Davis, Randy Brecker, Charles Earland, Elvin Jones, Stan Getz, Betty Carter, Von Freeman, Tito Puente, Tony Bennett, Les Claypool and Louis Bellson while still in high school! This led to his signing to Delmark Records at age 18 and a string of critically acclaimed recordings. Catalano has been heard by millions of people all over the world thanks in part to 3 Grammy-winning and 11 Grammy-nominated recordings with artists such as Jennifer Lopez, Destiny's Child, and John Legend. He recently performed live on the Oprah Winfrey TV show with singer/composer Seal. No stranger to adversity, Frank cut off his right middle finger in an automobile accident. After several surgeries and much effort, Catalano relearned his signature technique, making him one of the most in-demand musicians today. He regularly donates his musical services to the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. Also an entrepreneur, Frank has patented a devise that allows him to control his saxophone via midi components. Frank is a spokesperson/clinician/performing artist for companies such as Yamaha, Rico/D'Addario, and JodyJazz. He can be seen in their Print Ads worldwide. Catalano's songs have been used in the ad campaigns of Motorola, Jaguar, Land Rover, and Budweiser as well as numerous TV and Film productions. When not on tour or in the studio, Frank enjoys composing classical music. Frank graduated from DePaul University with a BA in music composition and he plays piano, drums and flute in addition to the saxophone. Frank's non-musical interests include racing his BWM 1-series in closed course competition. www.catalanomusic.com

Randy Brecker has been shaping the sound of Jazz, R&B and Rock for more than four decades. His trumpet and flugelhorn performances have graced hundreds of albums by a wide range of artists from James Taylor, Bruce Springsteen and Parliament-Funkadelic to Frank Sinatra, Steely Dan, David Sanborn, Jaco Pastorius, Horace Silver and Frank Zappa. Randy's history is as varied as it is distinguished. Born in Philadelphia to a piano-playing father, Randy's musical talent was nurtured and encouraged from an early age. He began playing R&B and funk in local bar bands while in his teens, and developed an ear for Hard Bop through his father's record collection. "I'd listen to Sonny Rollins, Lee Morgan, Miles' Quintets, Art Blakey, Horace Silver, the Clifford Brown/Max Roach group." As a composer, performer and in-demand Yamaha clinician, Randy Brecker continues to influence and inspire young musicians around the world. He feels like he is just starting out! www.randybrecker.com

Frank Catalano & Vic Juris Band
08/15 8:00 PM & 10:00 PM - $20.00
Buy For tickets to the 8:00pm show or 10:00pm show

Vic Juris A native of Jersey City, N.J., Juris took up guitar at age 10 during the summer of 1963. Accordion, he notes, was a far more popular instrument than guitar at that time. All that would change the following year when Beatlemania washed up on the Jersey shore. Juris got his first electric guitar on Christmas of 1964, and by the mid-'60s he was playing cover versions of Jimi Hendrix, Cream and the Temptations material in rock and R&B bands around his area. He discovered jazz in his late teens and subsequently studied with Philly jazz guitar legend Pat Martino. In 1975, Juris made his recording debut on alto saxophonist Eric Kloss' Bodies' Warmth (Muse). He later gigged with fusioneer Barry Miles before hooking up with alto-sax burner Richie Cole, appearing on two hot, boppish offerings in 1977's Alto Madness and 1978's Keeper of the Flame (both on Muse). In the early '80s, Juris immersed himself in acoustic guitar, performing duets with Larry Coryell and Biréli Lagrène, and by the late '80s he joined bassist Gary Peacock's group. For the past 10 years Juris has been hitting the road hard with the Dave Liebman Group. "The band started out where we had keyboards," says Juris, "and then Dave decided that he just wanted to go with the guitar. So my original role was kind of like a second horn, and the guitar is very cool for that. But now that's completely changed to where I'm more of a colorist and chordal accompanist while also doing a bit of the second horn thing." The Liebman gig affords Juris quite a bit of freedom. "Dave is into doing a wide variety of stuff and he pretty much gives me the green light to do whatever I want," says Juris. "He likes the fact that I can go through different styles in a given set and he also likes the effects for some of the electric Miles stuff that we do [culled from On the Corner, Get Up With It and Dark Magus, all recordings made during Liebman's tenure with the tumultuous Miles Davis bands of the early '70s]. So I carry a RAT pedal for a touch of distortion and I also use my Roland GR-50 guitar synth for colors and textures on some tunes. We also do some Jobim music in that band [from Liebman's GMN.com recording, The Unknown Jobim], so he likes me to play the nylon-string acoustic on that stuff." Juris uses a nylon-string Takamine acoustic guitar for the Brazilian music, but his main ax since 1980 has been a thin hollow-body guitar made by New Jersey luthier Tom Doyle. He also plays a closed archtop (no f-holes) built by Phoenix luthier Glen McKerrihan. http://vicjurisjazz.com