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Sunday, January 28, 2024
— a “hybrid” event —
John Howard Trio
John Howard, piano
Eric Harper, acoustic bass
Brad Linde, saxophone
Mostly Love Songs
A selection of classic and lesser known Jazz standards about love; new, old, lost, and found.
Biography
From a musical family, John Howard played many instruments before beginning piano study in his senior year of high school. He has a Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from UNC-Chapel Hill, where he attended on an Andy Griffith Scholarship. While in Chapel Hill he also played in the jazz bands and performed with drummer Louis Bellson and trombonist Al Grey of the Count Basie Orchestra. John began teaching music at the Edmund Burke School in Washington, DC in 1989, where he founded the music department. John’s Burke bands have performed at Blues Alley annually for almost 20 years. They are also founding performers of the Big Band Jam on the Mall. Since 1995 they are annual participants in the Georgetown Day School Jazz Festival. John’s trio performs weekly at the Little Beast Bistro in Chevy Chase, DC every Thursday from 6-8 pm.
Eric Harper is a graduate of Oberlin College and a Washington, DC, native. A regular performer on both piano and acoustic bass, he can be seen at a wide range of Washington area venues. He has also performed across the United States, as well as in Europe and Asia, and has performed with jazz artists such as Charlie Byrd, Ethan Iverson, Scott Hamilton, Bob Wilber, John Hicks, and Chuck Redd. As an educator, he has taught at schools including the Levine Music, Gettysburg College, and the Jazz Workshop.
Hailed as “the capital city’s contemporary cool king” (Giovanni Russonello, Capitalbop), Brad Linde is a saxophonist, educator, bandleader, and impresario in the Washington DC metro area. He is the director of Jazz and Creative Music at Georgetown Day School and founder of the Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra.
Raised in NC, he studied music at Elon University (BA) and attended UNC Chapel Hill before graduating from the University of Maryland, College Park with a MM. He learned the bebop language from Barry Harris and engaged in the Tristano School concepts with pianist Ed Paolantonio before studying privately with Lee Konitz and working with Ted Brown. In 2013, he was a participant in the Banff International Jazz and Creative Music Workshop.
He has performed or recorded with Lee Konitz, Oliver Lake, Greg Ward, Richie Cole, Steve Wilson, Charles McPherson, Caroline Davis, Ted Brown, Joel Frahm, Jon Irabagon, Keefe Jackson, Gary Smulyan, Frank Basile, John Mosca, Slide Hampton, Grachan Moncur III, Ryan Keberle, Eddie Bert, Wadada Leo Smith, Carol Morgan, Russ Johnson, Tara Kannangara, Erika Dohi, Russ Lossing, Freddie Redd, Barry Harris, Hod O’Brien, Dan Tepfer, Ran Blake, Anthony Coleman, Steve Cardenas, Anthony Pirog, Wendy Eisenberg, Butch Warren, Michael Formanek, Ratzo Harris, Jason Roebke, Luke Stewart, Matt Wilson, Allison Miller, Warren Wolf, Teddy Charles, Joe Chambers, Andrew Cyrille, and Fay Victor.
For over a decade, he has led large ensembles, including the Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra, the Brad Linde Expanded Ensemble, BIG OL’ (featuring the music of Australian composer Elliott Hughes), and the Team Players BIG LEAGUE.
The Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra debuted in April 2010, performing every Monday night at the historic Bohemian Caverns on U Street. During that time, and beyond, the orchestra has collaborated with Miho Hazama, Elliott Hughes, Ethan Iverson, Jeff Lederer, Jihye Lee, Angela Morris and Anna Webber, Brian Krock, Ken Schaphorst, Frank Carlberg, Nathan Parker Smith, Oliver Lake, Sheryl Bailey, among other guest artists. In 2018, the BCJO released two albums of arrangements and compositions by pianist Dan Roberts. In addition to Wammies (WAMA) awards and Jazzies “Best Of” awards (Washington City Paper), the orchestra received the 2012 Mayor’s Arts Award for Outstanding New Artist.
Small groups and chamber ensembles are at the core of his performances, with multiple projects and recordings. Those include the prolific quartet/quintet Team Players (featuring Aaron Quinn, Billy Wolfe, John J. Williamson, and Deric Dickens), avant-trad jazz ensemble DIX OUT, new music group Underwater Ghost, soprano saxophone quartet straightHORN, improvised music quartet Gumshoe, piano/saxophone duo ditchpanther, international composers quintet Raptor Billy, 2 Therapy Bands (each finding Linde on either drums or piano), urbane outfit, and the red-haired quartet GINGERBRED.
Brad maintained a long performance relationship with the legendary hardbop pianist/composer Freddie Redd, performing at Smalls Jazz Club, Birdland, JALC and other venues in New York, DC, and Baltimore from 2009 through 2013. He was also the musical director for the Freddie Redd/Butch Warren Quintet. He has recorded four albums and co-led a New York-based group with one of the original Tristano School members, tenor saxophonist Ted Brown, since 2010.
As a sideman, he appears with Wadada Leo Smith’s Thunder Ensemble, Jeff Cosgrove, Carol Morgan, Dylan Schuman’s Screaming Art Large Ensemble, the New Old Fashioneds, Billy Wolfe and the Composers Tetradectet, and the North Carolina Jazz Repertory Orchestra.
From 2011-2014, he was curator of the cutting-edge jazz series at the Atlas Performing Arts Center in Northeast Washington DC, presenting artists including Mark Turner, Steve Coleman, Geri Allen, Ambrose Akinmusire, Darcy James Argue, Mary Halvorson and more. He continues to present performances and collaborations in the Washington DC area, Baltimore, New York City, and in Durham and Chapel Hill, NC.
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