Jihye Lee Quintet Will Perform at Flushing Town Hall For APA Heritage Month

On Friday, May 21, the Jihye Lee Quintet will perform live from the stage at Flushing Town Hall for an all-virtual audience.

The livestream event honors Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and includes a special dedication to the women who were killed in the Atlanta, Georgia spa shootings in March.

"At Flushing Town Hall, we are responding to the recent rise in hate crimes as best we know how -- through the arts," says Ellen Kodadek, Executive & Artistic Director. "Our mission is to bring people together by presenting arts and culture from around the world. The Atlanta killings were widely understood to be driven by racism and misogyny. We are proud to present Jihye Lee's all-female, Korean jazz quintet to share their message and music with our diverse audience. Flushing Town Hall will continue to bring people together through the arts and ensure that artists of all backgrounds and traditions have a home on our stage. We are very much looking forward to featuring Jihye Lee's incredible talent. 50% of donation proceeds will go to support Korean American Family Service Center."

The concert, titled "Rest in the Arms of Motherlands," will feature Lee's original compositions, as well as her arrangements of well-known songs. The quintet features Lee's vocals alongside Hayoung Lyou (keys), Haeun Joo (piano), Jeonglim Yang (bass), Dayeon Seok (drums).

"Among the eight victims of the recent tragedy in Atlanta, six of them were Asian women, including four Koreans -- immigrants who courageously came to America for better lives. They innocently got killed, and left their loved ones behind," says Jihye Lee. "Motherland was the word that came to my mind. After many struggles and defeats, burdened lives are resting now. The souls are comforted in the loving arms of their motherlands."

Flushing Town Hall's event will be presented free of charge with a suggested, pay-what-you-can donation. Fifty percent of the funds raised will support the nonprofit, global arts presenter and fifty percent will be donated to the Korean American Family Service Center (KAFSC) in support of their Rainbow House Shelter, which provides comprehensive and culturally-competent services to women and children in crisis.

"KAFSC is grateful to Flushing Town Hall and the Jihye Lee Quintet for providing a space to honor the victims in the Atlanta shooting on March 16. The recent rise of anti-Asian violence and attacks against Asian-Americans, particularly against the elderly and women, is alarming and unacceptable. While COVID-19 has affected us all, Asians and Asian-Americans have been disproportionately impacted by the ongoing public health and economic crises. These unwarranted hate crimes against the members of our community add another layer of trauma for a people -- especially the elderly among them -- who already carry intergenerational trauma from collective histories of war, oppression, and uprootedness." says Jeehae Fischer, Executive Director of KAFSC. "KAFSC is the Chinjung (Mother's home) for hundreds of immigrant survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, and child abuse that KAFSC serves every year. We join Flushing Town Hall, the Jihye Lee Quintet, and all the viewers in dedicating this performance to all those lost in recent tragedies. May they rest in power."

A jazz composer and bandleader based in New York, Jihye Lee is highly regarded for her personal and adventurous storytelling approach to large-ensemble jazz. The Village Voice praised her first album, April, for its "chamber-like textures, involved harmony and sectional counterpoint, and persistent rhythmic drive." Her 2021 release, Daring Mind (on Motema Music), was produced by the innovative composer and Secret Society bandleader Darcy James Argue, with renowned trumpeter Sean Jones appearing as a special guest. It presents compositions from Lee's Mind Series, including her BMI Charlie Parker Jazz Composition Prize-winning "Unshakable Mind." The music reflects her struggles, doubts, and hopes while living in the amazing city of New York.

A native of South Korea, Lee had no jazz or classical training growing up, though she found success in Korea performing as an indie pop singer. She discovered her love of large-ensemble jazz only after beginning her studies at Boston's Berklee College of Music in 2011. After Berklee, she moved to New York in 2015 and earned a master's degree at Manhattan School of Music under the guidance of the great Jim McNeely. In addition to the BMI Foundation's Charlie Parker Jazz Composition Prize and Manny Albam Commission in 2018, Lee has received the 2020 ASCAP Foundation/Symphonic Jazz Orchestra Commissioning Prize. She has written music for the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis as well as Carnegie Hall's NYO Jazz.

Pianist Hayoung Lyou is an in-demand sideman and bandleader based in New York City. She frequently collaborates with multi-instrumentalist Jasper Dütz in their ongoing duo project and has recorded one album, Metamorphosis, for Endectomorph Music founded by Kevin Sun. Born in Korea, Hayoung Lyou began classical piano training at the age of five and won competitions such as the Seoul National Orchestra Piano Competition. She attended the Berklee College of Music on scholarship, studying with mentors such as Helen Sung, Hal Crook, and Joanne Brackeen. Lyou also completed graduate studies at the New England Conservatory, studying privately with Ethan Iverson, Jason Moran, and Frank Carlberg. Her most recent work includes recording for jazz flutist Jiyun Kim's début album, Rising, with Adam Rodgers, Alex Sipiagin, Andy Mckee, and Mark Ferber. Also, she is featured as a collaborator of Jacob Shulman's upcoming album.

Haeun Joo is a jazz pianist from South Korea. She started playing piano when she was five years old. She studied classical composition in Busan Art High School in Korea and went to Howon University to study Pop and Jazz. She has collaborated with several pop artists in Korea and has performed as a singer-songwriter after winning the Competition Yoo Jae-Ha for Songwriters. She moved to the United States in 2011 to study at Berklee College of Music, where she was offered a scholarship. She studied with Danilo Perez, George Garzone, Joan Brackeen, Neil Olmstead, Vadim Neselovskyi, and Hal Crook. After she graduated, she moved to New York to go to SUNY at Purchase and studied with John Abercrombie, David Hazeltine, Jon Faddis, Todd Coolman, Doug Weiss, and Ralph Lalama. She has been playing actively since she moved to New York and in some of the most important venues, including Dizzy's Coca Cola, Blue Note, Birdland, and Carnegie Hall, among others. Haeun Joo went to Mexico City in 2019 to play at Zinco Jazz Club and offered master classes there. She is currently living in New York and her debut album is coming out in August 2021.

Acoustic and electric bassist Jeonglim Yang from the Republic of Korea is widely renown for her distinguishing, eminent playing style. In September 2007 she put a hold on her prominent career in South Korea to pursue her studies at Berklee in the United States. While Yang resided in Boston, she joined the band of Jason Palmer (internationally acclaimed jazz trumpeter), with whom she performed every weekend at the historic jazz venue Wally's Jazz Café for two years (2008-2010). Yang also made a record with this band entitled Nothing to Hide (SteepleChase). Yang toured with Jason Palmer Quintet in many famous venues and festivals such as Tanglewood Jazz Festival, The Jazz Gallery, and the Stone Jazz Club in New York City.

Yang quickly marked her place as an attentive NYC musician after moved from Boston to New York (2011). She featured at numerous NYC's finest venues to perform such as The Stone, Fat Cat, Smalls, Cornelia Street café, Ibeam, Korzo, Shapeshifter Lab, Barbés, 55bar, Nublu, Greenwich House Music school, The Owl music parlor, Bar Lunatico, The Cell Theater with veteran artists as Kenny Wolleson, Jacob Sacks, Adam Kolker, Michael Attias, Nick Sanders, Logan Strosahl, Tim Berne, Oscar Noriega. Yang also joined Ernesto Llorens New York Jazz Project (2015), the group released an album "on my gypsy way" and toured in Europe extensively (2016- 2018). Yang performed at venues and festivals such as Sunset jazz club in France, Club de jazz mussol Casablanca, Jazz al Parador, Auditori del Jardi, Sala Clamores, Black Bird club, Castellon Jazz Festival, Refugio club, Jazzaza, Circular de Bellas Artes, Teatro Calderón in Spain. The group also made an appearance at the national radio show of Valencia.

In 2016, Yang joins a piano trio Crooked Trio and starts to make weekly residency at Barbés to the current. The Crooked trio releases their first record "The deluxe"(2018) (Barbés label) and held their successful album release show at the Greenwich House music school in New York City.

The year of 2017, Yang's original compositions and the work with her quintet been produced by Fresh Sound New Talent, the foremost contemporary jazz label in Spain. The debut release Déjà vu won NPR's critics poll in 2017 as the best debut album of the year. Déjà vu also received remarkable reviews from All About Jazz as an excellent debut album. Jeonglim Yang quintet featured at the Jazz Gallery in NYC which has been published many times as 'the best place to listen to jazz' from major magazines such as the Downbeat, the New Yorker and New York times. Yang joined as one of the three bassists in NYC of the great Paul Motian tribute concert 'Motian in Motion' (May 2017) as sound it out concert series. The concert was comprised of the all-star jazz musicians in NYC whom has had worked with the legendary jazz drummer Paul Motian in the past. Yang's other project group "mute" was formed in 2017 and pursues their unique Brooklyn styles of experimental music. The group has performed internationally at prestigious venues such as Dusk Dawn Club, Jiang Hu, East Shore Jazz Club, Good Bait in Beijing China, and Club Evans, Formtec Art Hall in Seoul, South Korea(2017). Mute's first record released is in 2019by Fresh Sound New Talent label.

Korean-born drummer Dayeon Seok came to the United States in 2008, earned a Bachelor's degree at Berklee College of Music and received a Master's degree at New York University in 2014. Currently based in New York City, her fresh and thoughtful approach to her instrument has been highly in demand from jazz musicians including pianist Russ Lossing, trumpeter Dave Douglas, and bassist Matt Pavolka, among others. Also active as a composer, she released her leader album Blurry Day Starry Night in 2016.

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