Bunky Green

Performer, educator, composer, arranger, lecturer, and music education consultant, Professor Green has 14 albums released in his name on vintage labels such as Chess, Exodus, Cadet, and Vanguard. As an international performer, educator, and lecturer, his European tours have taken him to Poland, Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, and Africa.

Professor Green received film credit for his background solo work in Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun, featuring Danny Glover and Esther Rolle. He is Past President and permanent chair of the Past Presidents Council of the world's largest jazz education organization, the International Association of Jazz Educators (IAJE). Professor Green received a rare five star rating from Downbeat Magazine for his album Healing the Pain. Along with Gary Burton, Gerald Wilson, Jackie McLean, and Rufus Reid, he was cited in a 1995 Downbeat Magazine article recognizing the nation's leading jazz educators who are also respected players.

In a 1997 Downbeat article, saxophone great Joe Lovano said, "Bunky personifies what jazz is all about. He's combined all the inspiration of Parker and Dolphy and fused it into an individual voice. He's the kind of player I've always strived to be in my music, taking hold of history and then moving on, through self-expression. Working alongside him has been a real highlight."

In January of 1999, Professor Green was inducted into the IAJE Hall of Fame. In 2003, he was inducted into the Downbeat Hall of Fame for Jazz Education.

Lynn Arriale

The Lynne Arriale Trio is putting the heart back into jazz” - The Sunday Times – London

“Lynne Arriale’s brilliant musicianship and bandstand instincts place her among the top jazz pianists of the day.” - The New York Times

Excerpts from Downbeat Magazine: 4 Stars - Over the last 15 years, Lynne Arriale has made a case for herself as a top-rank jazz pianist through her recordings. If any doubt existed that she can run with the big boys, this release dispels it. She stands toe-to-toe with trumpeter Randy Brecker in a stunning and affirmative collaboration. Their rapport is lucid, and their spontaneous exchanges often offer jewels of invention and exchange.

Sting’s “Wrapped Around Your Finger” crackles with passion and dynamism, without resorting to exhibitionism. In deference to the piano, Brecker might not play forte, but holds nothing back. He has a heartbreakingly beautiful flugelhorn feature on Arriale’s elegiac “Longing.” His lyricism is wistful yet aching, real holding-back-the-tears stuff.

Few pianists have such a spectrum of dynamics at their disposal as Arriale. She may whisper or attack, but never pounds. Her melodic improvisation on “Ballad Od The Sad Young Men” is crystalline and touching. Her playing features spiky treble statements that press the beat. Drummer Anthony Pinciotti seems to know what she’s going to play before Arriale does, and he’s right under her when he needs to be. Bassist George Mraz is the model of tasteful support and strong rhythmic input.

The CD includes a DVD of a live recital of the same program. The players seem a little more playful with the material. Arriale’s classical depth makes her virtuosic uptempo flight on “La Noche” a mini tour-de-force. Mraz, an ensemble player on the CD, gets a couple of solos on the DVD: pithy yet understated on “Young Men,” and nimble and articulate on “Gumbo.” “I Hear A Rhapsody” is a noticeably more adventurous–almost deconstructed–exploration. The rubato journey hangs together precariously, yet hands just the same. -Kirk Silsbee

Lynne Arriale, Winner of The Great American Jazz Piano Competition, has performed extensively with her trio over the past 15 years. Highlights include performances at the Mary Lou Williams Jazz Festival at the Kennedy Center, Jazz At Lincoln Center, Diet Coke's Women in Jazz Festival, The Gilmore Piano Festival and other international festivals including Cannes MIDEM, Burghausen, Stuttgart, Spoleto Arts, Cork, Montreux, Montreal, Monterey, Sardinia, North Sea, Pori, San Francisco, Ottawa, Rochester, Portugal's Estoril, Zagreb, Norway's Silda Jazz, Jacksonville, and Australia's Perth and Brisbane Jazz Festivals. Her trio has toured Canada, Germany, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Spain, Romania, Norway, Sweden, The Czech Republic, Croatia, Poland, Italy, England, Ireland, Scotland, and Australia. As part of Japan's “100 Golden Fingers” tour, Arriale performed with jazz legends Hank Jones, Tommy Flanagan, Kenny Barron, Harold Mabern, Junior Mance, Monty Alexander, Roger Kellaway, Ray Bryant, and Cedar Walton.

The Lynne Arriale Trio's tenth and current release, LIVE, won the German Record Critics Award for its CD/DVD of their 2005 Burghausen Festival performance. Previous releases include Come Together, Arise, which hit #17 on Billboard, #1 on UPI’s Best Jazz CDs ‘03, and along with its predecessor, Inspiration, reached #1 on national jazz radio, #1 in New Yorker Magazine’s Best CDs ’03 and also won that year’s German Record Critics Award. Lynne received the SESAC Award for Come Together. The trio’s earlier CDs include Live at Montreux, Melody, A Long Road Home, With Words Unspoken, When You Listen, and The Eyes Have It. Arriale has been featured in Billboard, Downbeat, JazzTimes, JAZZIZ, the BBC Magazine, the London Times, on the covers of One Way and M Magazines and covered extensively in other international print media. She has performed in concert and on NPR's “Piano Jazz" with Marian McPartland, two “Jazz Set" performances, hosted by Branford Marsalis and Dee Dee Bridgewater and "Weekend Edition." Other media appearances include CNN/FN’ Biz, NPR’s Jazz Piano Christmas - Live from The Kennedy Center, radio and television interviews throughout the US, UK and Europe, including the BBC, Radio France and German National Television. PBS is currently featuring Arriale's trio on "Profile of a Performing Artist," a series that has included Luciano Pavarotti, Diana Krall, and Elvis Costello.

Lynne conducts educational clinics and master classes throughout the United States and Europe, has been a faculty member of the Jamey Aebersold Jazz Workshops, the Centrum Port Townsend Jazz Workshop, and the Thelonious Monk Institute. She has performed at three IAJE conventions, APAP, and CMJ conventions, has served as an IAJE Resource Team Member in piano pedagogy, a member of the IAJE Sisters in Jazz Advisory Board, and has served as an adjudicator and guest artistic director of the Sisters in Jazz Collegiate Competition. Lynne has adjucated the Montreux Jazz Festival Piano Competition, the American Pianists Association Fellowship Awards, The Kennedy Center's Mary Lou Williams Competition, and the Great American Jazz Piano Competition. In August ’08, Arriale presented an extraordinary new lineup of iconic musicians on her new CD/DVD, Lynne Arriale – The Bennett Studio Sessions. In addition to Arriale as leader/composer/arranger, the band features jazz legend George Mraz on bass; Anthony Pinciotti on drums, whose work with James Moody and John Abercrombie has received high critical praise; and the great All-Star, Randy Brecker on trumpet and flugelhorn. The project was recorded at the multi-Grammy and Emmy Award winning BENNETT STUDIOS, and will include video documentation of behind the scenes footage of the CD recording, a bonus DVD program of a live, private, “in-studio” audience concert, and up close and personal interviews with each artist.