Stacey Kent, Billy Hart Quartet, and More to Play Birdland This Month

Birdland Jazz Club and Birdland Theater has announced programming running January 16 through January 29.

Performers appearing at Birdland Jazz Club include Stacey Kent, Billy Hart Quartet, Adam Birnbaum Quartet, Scott Robinson's Octet and Tony Kadleck.

Downstairs at Birdland Theater will be Olatuja Project, Nicole Zuraitis with Doug Wamble, Houston Person Quintet, Nicole Zuraitis and Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks.

Repeat engagements include David Ostwald's Louis Armstrong Eternity Band, Frank Vignola's Guitar Night, Birdland Big Band, and Arturo O'Farrill & The Latin Jazz Orchestra.

Jazz Programming at Birdland Jazz Club and Birdland Theater January 16 through January 29

January 16 (Monday) 7:00 & 9:30 PM - Birdland Jazz Club
Stacey Kent
A singer of marvelous talent, Stacey Kent's beautiful voice and natural musicality have been the feature of 11 studio albums, including Platinum, Double-Gold and Gold records that have garnered her a much-deserved worldwide audience. With performances in over 55 countries during her stellar career, Kent's global fandom makes perfect sense because of her miraculous fluency singing in French, Italian, German, Portuguese and English. Over the course of two decades as a recording artist, Kent's vision has broadened beyond the Great American Songbook: French and Brazilian classics also feature prominently in her contemporary work. Her latest album, Songs From Other Places, was released September of 2021. For this special show as a part of APAP NYC+, Kent is backed by her normal group of veteran collaborators. Her new studio album, Summer Me, Winter Me, is set for 2023 release.
$30 tables / $30 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 16 (Monday) 8:30 PM - Birdland Theater
Olatuja Project
Bassist Michael Olatuja and his wife, vocalist Alicia Olatuja, have toured the world with their solo projects for years, each recognized internationally for their popular work hybridizing jazz, African traditional sounds, funk, and modernist aesthetics. They have performed on jazz's biggest stages: Newport Jazz Festival, Montreal Jazz Festival, Monterey Jazz Festival, SFJAZZ, Jazz at Lincoln Center, and countless others. The couple's intimate and powerful collaboration, The Olatuja Project, brought about 2013's critically acclaimed The Promise (World Tune Records)-and while future recordings never materialized, the group reunites to present its music at this APAP NYC+ showcase. Do not miss these modern icons!
$30 tables / $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 17 (Tuesday) 5:30 PM - Birdland Theater
Nicole Zuraitis with Doug Wamble
Grammy-nominated Nicole Zuraitis is a New York-based vocalist, pianist, and songwriter who took home the Gold Medal and Ben Tucker Jazz Award in the 2021 American Traditions Competition. A musical chameleon, she brings her signature warmth and outstanding vocals to various genres and styles, as demonstrated on her newest multi-hyphenate album, All Wandering Hearts (Dot Time Records). As a bandleader, a recording artist, and the premiere vocalist of the world-famous Birdland Big Band and Dan Pugach Nonet, Nicole has established herself as a staple on the New York City jazz scene and has made a significant mark on the global modern jazz landscape.
$30 tables; $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 17-21 (Tuesday-Saturday) 7:00 & 9:30 PM (1/17-19); 8:30 & 10:30 PM (1/20-21) - Birdland Jazz Club
Billy Hart Quartet
One of the art form's greatest drummers and bandleaders, Billy Hart is an imaginative artist whose innovations on drum language of the 1960s placed him amongst modernists Jack Dejohnette, Joe Chambers, Elvin Jones and Tony Williams to bring jazz forward into the 1970s and beyond. Hart was the drummer in Herbie Hancock's Mwandishi band and Miles Davis's On the Corner band in the 1970s, recording also with Pharoah Sanders, Stan Getz, Cecil McBee, Kenny Barron, Lee Konitz, John Scofield, and countless others. One of the hardest-working veteran drummers in the music, Hart at 82 years old has been leading and supporting groups of younger stars for the last two decades, with Mark Turner, Ethan Iverson, and Ben Street forming the elder master's quartet. Their music is broad, pensive, and exploratory, as well as swinging.
$40 tables / $30 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 18 (Wednesday) 5:30 PM - Birdland Theater
David Ostwald's Louis Armstrong Eternity Band
Inspired by the noble jazz pioneers Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, Duke Ellington, Jelly Roll Morton and their colleagues, David Ostwald's Louis Armstrong Eternity Band breathes life and passion into America's own great art form. Now in its 18th year of residency at Birdland, the weekly post-workday engagement is the city's best musical bargain! Tuba player David Ostwald leads a rotating lineup that features talents such as clarinetist Anat Cohen, trombonist/vocalist Wycliffe Gordon, pianist Ehud Asherie, drummer Marion Felder and more!
$30 tables; $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 18 (Wednesday) 8:30 PM - Birdland Theater
Frank Vignola's Guitar Night
It's the best jazz guitar lover's show in the world. Frank Vignola's virtuosity has made him the guitarist of choice for many of the world's top musicians, including Ringo Starr, Madonna, Donald Fagen, Les Paul, the Boston and New York Pops, and more. Every Wednesday at 8:30pm in the Birdland Theater, Frank leads "Frank Vignola's Guitar Night at Birdland." Inspired by journeyman jazz guitarist John Pisano's now famous Los Angeles Guitar Night, the Frank Vignola Trio, featuring bassist Gary Mazzaroppi and drummer Vince Cherico, will perform tunes from the standard repertoire, inviting up a rotation of special guests.
$30 tables; $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 20 (Friday) 5:30 PM - Birdland Jazz Club
The Birdland Big Band
Every Friday, and for two headlining weeks a year, the "BBB" roars into action playing a thrilling and original mix of jazz, funk, Brazilian, Latin and world music for sold-out audiences. Featured weekly guest artists drop in from television bands (David Letterman, Saturday Night Live) and pop music touring bands (Rob Thomas, Rod Stewart). Come see for yourself why Time Out New York called the BBB "A completely unique experience... there isn't another band like this anywhere," and why yelp.com proclaims, "If you hear one band in NYC make sure this is it... and prepare to be blown away!"
$30 + $20 food/drink minimum

January 20-22 (Friday-Sunday) 7:00 & 9:30 PM - Birdland Theater
Houston Person Quintet
The 87 year-old jazz legend Houston Person has NOT slowed down. In fact, with one or two scattered exceptions, Person has continued to release at least one record per year as a leader for the past nearly 60 years. A jazz lover's jazzman, this great artist plays from his soul with a great mastery of affect, technique, and style. He has served as a sideman for Etta Jones (15 recordings), Joey Defrancesco, Ron Carter, Horace Silver, Richard "Groove" Holmes, and too many others to name. This engagement is sure to be as swinging, blues-soaked, and robust as ever.
$30 tables / $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 22 (Sunday) 5:30 PM - Birdland Jazz Club
Adam Birnbaum Quartet
Adam Birnbaum is emerging as one of the top young voices in jazz piano. A presence on the New York City scene as a leader and sideman, Birnbaum has performed all over NYC and international venues. As a leader, Birnbaum has released four albums under his name in Japan and the U.S. His most recent, Three Of A Mind, featuring bassist Doug Weiss and drummer Al Foster, was hailed as "an eloquent dispatch from the heart of the contemporary piano trio tradition" by the New York Times and received an Editor's Pick and four star review in DownBeat Magazine.
$30 tables / $30 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 22 (Sunday) 8:30 & 10:30 PM - Birdland Jazz Club
Arturo O'Farrill & The Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra
Pianist, composer and educator Arturo O'Farrill-leader of the "first family of Afro-Cuban Jazz" (The New York Times)-leads the GRAMMY award winning Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra (ALJO), who bring together the drama of big band jazz, the culture of Latin music, and the virtuosity of eighteen of the world's most accomplished solo musicians. Twelve years of critically-acclaimed performances internationally have firmly established the ALJO as the standard-bearer for creative interpretation of Latin jazz greats such as Tito Puente, Frank "Machito" Grillo, and Chico O'Farrill, as well as the driving force behind new commissions from Latin music's most talented composers and arrangers.
$30 + $20 food/drink minimum

January 24 (Tuesday) 5:30 PM - Birdland Theater
Nicole Zuraitis
Grammy-nominated Nicole Zuraitis is a New York-based vocalist, pianist, and songwriter who took home the Gold Medal and Ben Tucker Jazz Award in the 2021 American Traditions Competition. A musical chameleon, she brings her signature warmth and outstanding vocals to various genres and styles, as demonstrated on her newest multi-hyphenate album, All Wandering Hearts (Dot Time Records). As a bandleader, a recording artist, and the premiere vocalist of the world-famous Birdland Big Band and Dan Pugach Nonet, Nicole has established herself as a staple on the New York City jazz scene and has made a significant mark on the global modern jazz landscape.
$30 tables; $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 24-28 (Tuesday-Saturday) 7:00 & 9:30 PM (1/24-26); 8:30 & 10:30 PM (1/27-28) - Birdland Jazz Club
The Octet Celebrates Frank Wess
Frank Wess was one of jazz's most beloved figures. The tenor and flute man in Count Basie's Orchestra, Wess's smooth sound can be heard on countless recordings, including those for which he assembled an eight-piece band, the Frank Wess Octet. In cooperation with Wess's estate, reedist Scott Robinson and a group of master musicians (Rufus Reid, Dennis Mackrel, Michael Weiss, and Bill Easley and Steve Turre) will perform these beautiful octet arrangements.
$40 tables / $30 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 25 (Wednesday) 5:30 PM - Birdland Theater
David Ostwald's Louis Armstrong Eternity Band
Inspired by the noble jazz pioneers Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, Duke Ellington, Jelly Roll Morton and their colleagues, David Ostwald's Louis Armstrong Eternity Band breathes life and passion into America's own great art form. Now in its 18th year of residency at Birdland, the weekly post-workday engagement is the city's best musical bargain! Tuba player David Ostwald leads a rotating lineup that features talents such as clarinetist Anat Cohen, trombonist/vocalist Wycliffe Gordon, pianist Ehud Asherie, drummer Marion Felder and more!
$30 tables; $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 25 (Wednesday) 8:30 PM - Birdland Theater
Frank Vignola's Guitar Night
It's the best jazz guitar lover's show in the world. Frank Vignola's virtuosity has made him the guitarist of choice for many of the world's top musicians, including Ringo Starr, Madonna, Donald Fagen, Les Paul, the Boston and New York Pops, and more. Every Wednesday at 8:30pm in the Birdland Theater, Frank leads "Frank Vignola's Guitar Night at Birdland." Inspired by journeyman jazz guitarist John Pisano's now famous Los Angeles Guitar Night, the Frank Vignola Trio, featuring bassist Gary Mazzaroppi and drummer Vince Cherico, will perform tunes from the standard repertoire, inviting up a rotation of special guest guitarists: Sheryl Bailey (1/4), Paul Bollenback (1/11), Perry Smith (1/18), Pasquale Grasso (1/25)
$30 tables; $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 27 (Friday) 5:00 PM - Birdland Jazz Club
The Birdland Big Band
Every Friday, and for two headlining weeks a year, the "BBB" roars into action playing a thrilling and original mix of jazz, funk, Brazilian, Latin and world music for sold-out audiences. Featured weekly guest artists drop in from television bands (David Letterman, Saturday Night Live) and pop music touring bands (Rob Thomas, Rod Stewart). Come see for yourself why Time Out New York called the BBB "A completely unique experience... there isn't another band like this anywhere," and why yelp.com proclaims, "If you hear one band in NYC make sure this is it... and prepare to be blown away!"
$30 + $20 food/drink minimum

January 27-29 (Friday-Sunday) 7:00 & 9:30 PM - Birdland Theater
Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks
Catch Vince Giordano & The Nighthawks for a weekend of performances after their highly successful two-month, Tuesday-night residency at the Birdland Theater. Giordano, the recipient of a GRAMMY Award for his work scoring the HBO show Boardwalk Empire, is a master composer and arranger whose 11-piece band, The Nighthawks, recreate the jubilant 1920s jazz sound with amazing definition, using violins, tubas, banjos, and collector's item drum sets. The band has provided soundtracks for film and television productions including The Cotton Club, The Aviator, Finding Forrester, Revolutionary Road, Cafe Society, Boardwalk Empire, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and many more. Not to be missed!
$30 tables / $20 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 29 (Sunday) 5:30 PM - Birdland Jazz Club
Tony Kadleck
The ever-swinging Tony Kadleck Big Band is a veteran large ensemble composed of New York City's finest jazz statesmen. Tony Kadleck's career in music has been marked by top recording work with artists such as Tony Bennett, Natalie Cole, Luther Vandross, Celine Dion, and the Maria Schneider Jazz Orchestra, as well as live performances with the legendary Count Basie Orchestra, Buddy Rich Big Band, Ella Fitzgerald, Isaac Hayes, Frank Sinatra, Blood, Sweat & Tears, the New York Pops, John Pizzarelli's "Swing Seven," Steely Dan, and many more. With his Big Band, Kadleck focuses on smart arrangements of songs by Stevie Wonder, Michel Legrand, Cannonball Adderly, Marvin Gaye, Michael Brecker, and others.
$30 tables / $30 bar + $20 food/drink minimum

January 29 (Sunday) 8:30 & 10:30 PM - Birdland Jazz Club
Arturo O'Farrill & The Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra
Pianist, composer and educator Arturo O'Farrill-leader of the "first family of Afro-Cuban Jazz" (The New York Times)-leads the GRAMMY award winning Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra (ALJO), who bring together the drama of big band jazz, the culture of Latin music, and the virtuosity of eighteen of the world's most accomplished solo musicians. Twelve years of critically-acclaimed performances internationally have firmly established the ALJO as the standard-bearer for creative interpretation of Latin jazz greats such as Tito Puente, Frank "Machito" Grillo, and Chico O'Farrill, as well as the driving force behind new commissions from Latin music's most talented composers and arrangers.
$30 + $20 food/drink minimum

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