Jim Knapp by Steve Korn.
The Jim Knapp Orchestra
“Jim Knapp's music is full of intensity, emotion, and creative textures with many varied influences. His music should be more known. It’s among the best of orchestral jazz being written these days.”
“Knapp's lyrical, sophisticated, Gil Evans-like arrangements roil like clouds on a blustery day, with multiple themes surfacing and submerging in the complex harmonies. He also uses the best musicians in town.”
The Jim Knapp Orchestra
Sat, Oct 31, 2009, 8:00 pm
PONCHO Hall, Cornish College of the Arts
Come celebrate the release of the Jim Knapp Orchestra’s new CD on the Origin label with a Halloween evening performance by this vaunted fifteen-piece ensemble.
The Jim Knapp Orchestra is a fifteen-piece jazz ensemble that has achieved a unique and original sound performing the compositions and arrangements of Jim Knapp. The orchestra features many of the finest jazz soloists in the Northwest, and has appeared in collaboration with Lee Konitz, Jay Clayton, Julian Priester, Jovino Santos Neto, Robin Holcomb, Kirk Nurock, Carla Bley and Steve Swallow.
Jim Knapp, director of the Jim Knapp Orchestra, trumpet player, composer, and teacher was born in Chicago, received BA and MA degrees in Music Composition from the University of Illinois, and lives in Seattle. He has served as director of The Composers and Improvisors Orchestra and has led various small jazz groups such as Ohio Howie and the Temple of Boom, and the J-Word.
Knapp founded and developed the jazz program at Cornish College of the Arts in the late 1970s, where he continues to teach and currently serves as a Professor of Music. In 2006, he was honored by Cornish College with a special “35 Years of Jazz” award in recognition of his many years of service to that institution. Knapp has also received a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Composition Fellowship, a Seattle Arts Commission Individual Artist Music Composition grant, a Special Projects Music Composition award from the King County Arts Commission, and support from Meet the Composer and Artist Trust. In 2007, he was also inducted into the Earshot Hall of Fame.
Knapp has recorded as a composer and/or performer on the ECM, A-Records, Origin, Pony Boy, Seabreeze, Flying Fish, Catalyst, and Mode record labels. The Jim Knapp Orchestra is represented on three commercially released recording: Things for Now (A-Records), On Going Home (Seabreeze), and Secular Breathing (Origin). The orchestra has also received Earshot “Best Acoustic Jazz Group” and “Recording of the Year” awards.
Event Tickets:
$18 in advance
$20 at the door
$10 for students, seniors, and Cornish alumni
Presented in association with Earshot Jazz.
Cornish College of the Arts Music Series 2009/10 is funded by:
- © 2009 Cornish College of the Arts. All rights reserved. Site by IF/THEN.