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Sunday, October 4 2026, 7:30 PM

Jan Knutson Trio

Jan Knutson – guitar
Grant Le – bass guitar
Eric Tapper Pers – drums

Jan Knutson Trio at the Salon

This Sunday, October 4, Jan Knutson will be performing his own compositions at Emerson Avenue Salons. Jan is a highly accomplished guitarist based in Washington D.C. with a wide ranging musical background in styles such as jazz, classical, rock, blues, and bluegrass, blending them all in fresh, eclectic, and dynamic original works. This particular concert will feature some of Jan’s renowned unaccompanied solo guitar stylings as well as in trio format, featuring Grant Le on Bass and Eric Tapper Pers on drums.

About the Artists

Jan Knutson is an acclaimed guitarist and composer based in Washington, DC. His wide ranging musical knowledge of jazz, bluegrass, classical, rock, and world music have made him a sought after player in the DC musical community. He has been priveleged to perform with some of the world’s finest guitarists including, Frank Vignola, Martin Taylor, Jimmy Bruno, Pasquale Grasso, and Julian Lage. He has recorded five albums, three of which are all original music.

In addition to performing at major venues in the DC area including the Kennedy Center, Strathmore, and solo shows at Blues Alley, he has been a featured artist at Birdland in NYC, the Richmond Folk Festival, the True Blue Jazz Festival and the Marlow International Guitar Series. In 2018 at the age of 19, he won the guitarist/arranger position with the United States Army Orchestra and in 2024 joined the US Army Blues Jazz Ensemble.

Jan has been blessed with wonderful teachers including Paul Wingo, Bob Sneider, Steve Abshire and Frank Vignola. He studied for two years with Rodney Jones at the Manhattan School of Music before joining the Army Band. He completed his Bachelor’s of Music degree at the University of MD where he studied with Gerry Kunkel.

Grant Le is a bassist from the Chicago area, in Hanover Park, IL. Grant originally studied piano and trumpet as a child and began playing the bass in middle school as a member of the district jazz band. In high school, he was awarded the Bill May Jazz Education Fund Scholarship, which allowed him to study at the Illinois Summer Youth Music Camp, where he was mentored by Larry Gray, one of Chicago’s finest bassists. The skills and experiences that Grant gained during that time allowed him to earn spots in the ILMEA District 7 Jazz Band, District 7 Honors Jazz Combo, and All-State Honors Jazz Combo, where he held the spot for two years in a row in 2017 and 2018. Grant has had the opportunity to perform with amazing artists such as Chicago-drummer and bandleader Jimmy Bennington, as well as world renowned trumpet player Roger Ingram.

The summer before his senior year, Grant attended the Birch Creek Summer Music Camp, where he played in the Ambassador Combo and studied with Jeff Campbell, who he will also be working with this fall when he begins his studies at Eastman.

Eric Tapper Pers has been playing drums since age 13. Pers attended the University of North Texas’s prestigious Jazz Studies program where he studied under the tutelage of master educator Ed Soph. At the University of North Texas, Pers was a member of the multi-Grammy-nominated One O’Clock Lab Band and received the award for Outstanding Undergraduate in Percussion. Upon graduation, Pers moved to Anaheim, California, where he was a member of the 2017 All-American College Band at Disneyland. He performed for over one million people over the course of the summer and has attended masterclasses led by some of the most in-demand and successful musicians in the country. Immediately after his work at Disneyland ended, he won the audition for the position of drummer for The U.S. Army’s premier jazz ensemble, The U.S. Army Blues. Upon arriving at Ft. Myer, he was the youngest member in The U.S. Army Band “Pershing’s Own.” He has been living in the Washington, D.C., area since 2018.

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