Cameron's 80th Birthday Celebration!

"Cameron Brown and Dannie's Calypso was born out of my initial emersion in the music of Miles Davis, my seminal experience performing with Don Cherry and ten years of exhilarating intensity with Don Pullen, George Adams and Dannie Richmond.  In addition to original compositions, we especially experiment with Don Cherry’s, "cocktail suite" concept:  a harmelodic melding of a number of compositions into a cohesive, continuous collage of music.  Following Don’s original concept, almost any tune, from early bebop gems, to Ornette’s and Don’s originals, to Albert Ayler melodies, to Jobim bosses can find their way into these suites. The band features a group of astounding improvisers:  Dave Ballou (Steely Dan, Michael Formanek, Mary Halvorson, Andrew Hill, Maria Schneider, Gunther Schuller, Steeplechase records) trumpet, flugelhorn and cornet; Jason Rigby (Mike Holober, John Patitucci, Jim McNeely, Donnie McCaslin, Tony Malaby, Slide Hampton, Fresh Sounds records), tenor and soprano saxophones; Lisa Parrott (Gunther Sculler, Dennis Charles, Jason Lindner, DIVA, Jimmy Heath, ABC records, Goat Angel records), baritone, alto and soprano saxophones, Cameron Brown (George Russell, Don Cherry, Archie Shepp, Art Blakey, Don Pullen/George Adams, Dewey Redman, Sheila Jordan, Joe Lovano, Omnitone records), bass;  Tony Jefferson (Lou Donaldson, Don Friedman, Kenny Drew Jr., Eddie Harris, James Weidman, Annie Ross) drums and cymbals."

"I met Don Cherry in July of 1965 in Stockholm. We played a gig opening for Bud Powell in August. I heard his phenomenal working band from Paris with Gato Barbieri, Karl Berger, Jean-François Jenny-Clarke and Aldo Romano that winter. In February ’66, I got a call from Don. He wanted me to come down to Club Montmartre in Copenhagen and work the month of March with the band. Jenny-Clarke was busy with his master’s recital at the Paris Conservatory. I was committed to play a concert on 11 March in Oslo with George Russell, but I came down and did the first week. Being in the middle of that energy changed my life forever. At the moment when John Coltrane was playing one tune for an hour, Don was approaching improvisation from the opposite direction. He created suites, “cocktails,” he called them, of not only his tunes and Ornette’s tunes and Albert Ayer’s tunes, but also classics of the jazz repertoire going back to the forties, Jobim tunes, which were so new and fresh at that moment, standards - anything that struck his ear were skillfully poured into the cocktail and mixed and blended through Don’s unique creative matrix."

Cameron Brown

Bassist, composer and educator Cameron Brown began his career in the mid-sixties, recording in Europe with George Russell and Don Cherry. These important innovators remain life-long inspirations and influences.

Beginning in 1975, Mr. Brown anchored some of the most important ensembles of the seventies, eighties, nineties, and into the current century. Sheila Jordan, Roswell Rudd, Archie Shepp and Beaver Harris were other early mentors and bandleaders. He has enjoyed special relationships with master drummers: Art Blakey, Dannie Richmond, Philly Joe Jones, Edward Blackwell, Eddie Moore, Idris Muhammad, Billy Hart, Lewis Nash and Matt Wilson as well as Mr. Harris.

The Don Pullen/George Adams Quartet, featuring Dannie Richmond, developed into an intense and rewarding partnership which lasted nearly ten years. In addition to this quartet, Beaver Harris’s 360 Degree Music Experience, Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, the Sextet and Big Bands of George Russell, the Dannie Richmond Quintet, the Dewey Redman Quartet, and various ensembles led be Mr. Shepp, Mr. Cherry, Mr. Rudd, Don Byron and Joe Lovano, Mr. Brown has performed and/or recorded with Donald Byrd, Booker Ervin, Ted Curson, Lee Konitz, Chet Baker, Terumasa Hino, Marco Tamburini, Betty Carter, Houston Person, Etta Jones, Ben Riley, Lou Donaldson, Jim McNeely, George Cables, Joe Locke, Salvatore Bonafede, Tony Malaby, Jeremy Steig, and Marc Copland.

He’s helped young people around the world to nurture their interest in and passion for jazz from North Carolina to Norway, from Helsinki to New York, to Hong Kong and Taiwan. He is on the faculty at the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music in New York City, the Green Meadow Waldorf School in Chestnut Ridge, New York and  at the Vermont Jazz Center’s summer workshop.

At present, Mr. Brown performs and records in duo with Sheila Jordan, and with various ensembles led by Joe Lovano, David Janeway, Don Byron, Jane Ira Bloom, Jason Rigby,  Lena Bloch and Feathery, Krzysztof Popek, Harvey Diamond, Rob Scheps Core-tet, Kristen Lee Sergeant, Kazuki Yamanaka, and Carl Stormer (www.jazzcode.com).

He leads two ensembles: “Cameron Brown and the Hear and Now” and “Cameron Brown and Dannie’s Calypso.” and has appeared on more than 200 recordings as well as DVDs with Art Blakey and Archie Shepp. Cameron Brown and the Hear and Now has two releases on the Omnitone label: “Here and How!” and “Here and How!, Volume 2.”

Dave Ballou

Trumpeter/Composer Dave Ballou can be heard in a variety of settings, from solo trumpet improvisations to large ensembles. His recordings can be found on the Steeplechase, CleanFeed, pfMentum and the Out of Your Head record labels. He has performed with a range of artists including Gunther Schuller, Sheila Jordan, Andrew Hill, Oliver Lake, Woody Herman, Steely Dan, David Sanford, John Hollenbeck, Wadada Leo Smith, Joe Lovano, Rabih Abou Khalil, Joe Maneri, Dewy Redman, and Billy Hart. His compositions have been performed and recorded by the Meridian Arts Ensemble, Trumpeter Jon Nelson, French hornist Adam Unsworth, Saxophonist Ellery Eskelin, the TILT Brass Ensemble and the Rose City Brass Quintet. Ballou is a Professor of Music at Towson University teaching in the Jazz and Commercial Music Division.

Tony Jefferson

Tony Jefferson, a New York native, is an accomplished drummer who has been a fixture on the New York jazz scene for many years. He has toured around the globe, performing at both festivals and clubs with world-class musicians.

Tony has performed and recorded with many jazz artists and groups, including Eddie Harris, Kenny Drew Jr., Lonnie Smith, Eddie Henderson, Lou Donaldson, Frank Wess, Don Friedman, Cyrus Chestnut, Mark Whitfield, Jerry Bergonzi, Joey Calderazzo, Freddy Cole, Hank Jones, Benny Golson, Cedar Walton, Vic Juris, Charles McPherson, John Abercrombie, Marc Copland, Rick Margitza, Cameron Brown (Danny’s Calypso and The Here & Now), Paul Beaudry and Pathways (Jazz Ambassadors Tours for Jazz at Lincoln Center), the Jazz for Young People’s Program (JALC), Don Byron (Ivey Divey Trio), James Weidman, Sheila Jordan, Nancy King, Ernestine Anderson, Annie Ross, The Westchester Jazz Orchestra, Lew Tabackin, Elio Villafranca, Eric Person, and Bridge Muzik (classical and jazz: concerts and workshops).

Tony Jefferson attended the Berklee College of Music in 1984 and, in 1992, placed third in the Thelonious Monk International Drum Competition. He has taught workshops and master classes in the U.S. and abroad.

Although specializing in jazz, Tony is a versatile musician whose inventive playing is shaped by his diverse musical experiences. His passion for woodwinds and his melodic approach to the drums have led him to perform as a vocalist.

Lisa Parrott

Born in Australia and based in New York City since 1993, Lisa works with a range of prominent jazz groups. She received a 2024 Chamber Music America New Jazz Works grant to compose for her septet, We Love Ornette. This follows a 2021 CMA Performance Plus grant for workshops with Denardo Coleman and a subsequent recording. Her album Round Tripper received four stars in DownBeat magazine. She has been recognized in DownBeat’s Critics and Readers Polls since 2013 and won the 2016 “Rising Star” category for baritone saxophone.

Lisa is in demand as a baritone saxophonist and bass clarinetist with major big bands, having performed with Skitch Henderson and the New York Pops, the Artie Shaw Orchestra, Jimmy Heath’s Big Band, Marty Ehrlich's Large Ensemble, Joel Harrison’s Large Ensemble, the Webber/Morris Big Band, and the Diva Jazz Orchestra, where she held the baritone sax/bass clarinet chair from 1998 to 2015. Other performance credits include Dave Brubeck, Nancy Wilson, Johnny Mandel, Cindy Blackman, Gunther Schuller, Marty Ehrlich, and Allison Miller.

Lisa has performed at Carnegie Hall, the Blue Note, and Lincoln Center, as well as at prestigious jazz festivals around the world, including the Montreal Jazz Festival. As a touring musician, she has performed in all 50 U.S. states. As a composer, her original works have been featured over the past 30 years at venues such as the Kennedy Center, Tri-C JazzFest, and festivals throughout Australia and Europe, as well as in jazz clubs worldwide.

Jason Rigby

Jason Rigby is a distinctive voice in contemporary jazz and improvised music — a saxophonist whose sound is as deeply rooted in tradition as it is committed to discovery. Born on a U.S. Naval base in Japan and raised in a musical Sicilian-Irish family, Rigby’s path was set the moment he first heard Coleman Hawkins’ Body and Soul on the radio at age ten. From that point forward, the saxophone became not just an instrument, but a home.

Rigby grew up immersed in Cleveland’s vibrant jazz scene, studying with tenor saxophonist Ernie Krivda and sharing stages with local legends like Jamey Haddad and Joe Lovano. His formal studies took him through Youngstown State University, DePaul University, and ultimately the Manhattan School of Music, where his creative world expanded through mentorship from Dick Oatts, Rich Perry, Mike Abene, and others.

Now based in New York City, Rigby has performed with the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, Mark Guiliana, Eivind Opsvik, Kris Davis, John Patitucci, and Billy Hart, among many others. His playing is noted for its spiritual depth, bold tone, and improvisational clarity — equally at home in traditional jazz settings and experimental, genre-blending projects.

He leads several of his own ensembles and appears on numerous recordings across the jazz spectrum. His latest project, MAYHEM — a boundary-pushing duo collaboration with drummer Mark Guiliana and producer Pete Min — explores the intersection of live improvisation and studio experimentation.

Whether on saxophones or weaving in analog synth textures, Rigby’s voice is unmistakable: soulful, exploratory, and deeply human.