199 Chambers St
New York, NY 10007
USA
Artistic Director of Jazz Programming Willard Jenkins to interview Helen Sung.
The Lost Jazz Shrines series is dedicated to bringing legendary NYC jazz clubs back into the consciousness of the world with a thorough remembrance and celebration. Boomer’s was a jazz club in Greenwich Village, New York City, during the 1970s. The club was a venue for bebop musicians, and artists Barry Harris and Kenny Barron played there. At the club, Cedar Walton recorded the albums, A Night at Boomers, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2. Cedar Walton was an American hard bop jazz pianist. He came to prominence as a member of drummer Art Blakey’s band before establishing a long career as a bandleader and composer. Several of his compositions have become jazz standards, including “Mosaic”, “Bolivia”, “Holy Land”, “Mode for Joe” and “Fantasy in D.”
Our Musical Director is the award-winning pianist-composer Helen Sung. Pianist/composer Helen Sung is a graduate of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance and won the Kennedy Center’s Mary Lou Williams Jazz Piano Competition. Her newest album Quartet+ garnered a 4.5 star DownBeat review and inclusion in its “Best of 2021 Albums” list, and a JazzTimes cover story (January 2022 issue). Previous releases Sung With Words (2018) and Anthem For A New Day (2014) topped the jazz charts. In addition to her own band, Helen has performed with such luminaries as the late Clark Terry, Wayne Shorter, Ron Carter, Wynton Marsalis, Regina Carter, Terri Lyne Carrington, Cecile McLorin Salvant, and more.
Helen’s 2021 Guggenheim Fellowship is being applied toward a multi-movement composition for big band; one of the movements, “Wayne’s World,” won the 2022 BMI Charlie Parker Jazz Composition Prize.
Covid Policy: Masks are optional. If you are feeling any COVID-related or flu-like symptoms on the day of the show, please stay home or seek medical attention, and be safe. Covid Policy is Subject to change.