Wednesday, October 11, 2023, 6-8:30pm will continue our music series held at El Cerrito Natural Grocery Company Prepared Food Annex (The Annex) – “The Annex Sessions”
Charged Particles
The most exciting and creative music being made today crosses stylistic boundaries and blends diverse traditions to create engaging new sounds. Charged Particles features three of the country’s virtuosos doing just that in the acoustic and electric jazz arena. Murray Low is a keyboard wizard with dazzling Latin-jazz technique and imaginative improvisational skills. Aaron Germain is an inventive and sophisticated acoustic and electric bassist. Along with fiery drummer Jon Krosnick, these players are making some of the most electrifying jazz in the country today.
The trio’s funky Latin jazz repertoire, blending in elements of classical music, mixes complex orchestration with freewheeling improvisation. The band brings a similar approach to playing their own arrangements of jazz standards, each played with a new twist.
All of the trio’s music has a distinctly acoustic sensibility, despite the members playing both acoustic and electric acoustic instruments. The group’s hallmark is sensitivity and spontaneity among the players, making each performance a spontaneous group exploration. The band’s energy level is always high, even when they are cooking at a volume no louder than a whisper, or floating through the melody of a romantic ballad. Watching the group, it’s obvious that they have fun playing together and admire each other’s musical instincts.
Charged Particles made its public debut on National Public Radio Affiliate WDET’s live performance program, “Detroit Jazz Alive”, originating in Detroit, Michigan. The group’s one-hour live performance drew wide attention and opened the door to performances at festivals and clubs around the world. In addition to its own headline performances, the band has opened for national recording artists such as Al DiMeola, Stanley Jordan, Yanni, and the group has had such international mega-star drummers as Peter Erskine and Dennis Chambers and percussionist Doc Gibbs sit in with them.
In 2011, the third generation of Charged Particles was born in California. The west coast trio began with Murray Low firing up the keyboards and Jason Muscat on electric bass. When Jason joined the touring band “Tainted Love”, Aaron Germain took over blazing on the acoustic and electric basses. Playing new original compositions, as well as the long-time original repertoire of the band and compositions by their favorite contemporary composers, Murray, Aaron, and Jon are busy gigging.
Highlights for the band in recent years have been a performance on the main stage of Yoshi’s San Francisco jazz club accompanying French Vietnamese guitarist Nguyen Le playing his compositions, an appearance accompanying vocalist Kevyn Lettau singing her compositions at Cafe Cordiale in Los Angeles, and performances in the Los Angeles area with keyboardist David Garfield.
The band has been collaborating regularly with powerhouse vocalist Rocío Guitard.
An exciting innovation for the group has been its collaboration with powerhouse reed player Paul McCandless (of the famed super-group Oregon) playing his own compositions. The group has been appearing as headliners at the famed jazz clubs Birdland (in New York City), Blues Alley (in Washington, DC), Yoshi’s (in San Francisco), and Nighttown (in Cleveland), as well as at the San Luis Obispo Jazz Festival, the Stanford Jazz Festival, the Erie Blues and Jazz Festival, and other venues around California and the east coast.
Another exciting project is a celebration of the music of tenor saxophone great Michael Brecker, featuring Bay Area tenor saxophonist Tod Dickow. The group has been bringing alive Brecker’s music and spirit. Their CD of the music gained acclaim in numerous jazz publications world-wide, including lengthy feature articles in Jazziz magazine and Jazz Times magazine, plus airplay on numerous radio stations in the U.S. and abroad. The trio has been touring with Dickow around the U.S. and in the U.K., and a recent sold-out show featured Brecker’s brother, acclaimed trumpeter Randy Brecker, at the famed jazz club Birdland in New York City.
The Natural Grocery Company is proud to present this series in partnership with SunJams and Javier Navarrette Music Productions.
SunJams is committed to funding children’s music education in underserved public elementary schools. Your donation will help support this ongoing program.
All of the proceeds will go directly to our network of local musicians, each of whom have been severely impacted by the lack of events during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Whether you donate $10, $100, or $1000 – any amount helps and will allow us to keep bringing music to our community! As always, your donation to SunJams 501(c)3 may qualify as tax exempt.
Javier Navarrette Music Productions continues to bring live music to several venues around the Bay Area. Javier has been a professional musician and music educator in the Oakland Unified School District for the past 20 years. Over the past few years Navarrette has produced outdoors events that have proven instrumental in enabling musicians to deal with some of the fallout of the pandemic and shutdown that followed.
COVID RELATED SAFETY MEASURES
Please be safe. Feel free to wear a mask if you prefer.
TICKETS
Tickets are NOT required for this venue, you can simply come in, order food and beverages at the Annex counter and pay at the registers.