AL LAZARD, Saxophone
Additional Info Al Lazard was born and raised in New Orleans, LA a city that is widely recognized for its indigenous musical art form, jazz. Al’s innovation, experimentation, and passion for jazz helped shape his love for the saxophone. He started playing the saxophone at the age of 9. Along side his father, “Dutt” Lazard, Al played and marched in many second lines. He started playing professionally at the age of 14 and has had the pleasure and experience of playing with several New Orleans’ greats – Rebirth Brass Band and The Neville Brothers. He studied music at Southern University under Kidd Jordan (Kidd Jordan Jazz Band).
He moved to the Bay Area in 1987 and has worked with Herbert Mims and Jim Grantham. He lends his soulful sax to an upcoming local Bay Area band, Highwayone Band. He continues to stay active, gigging throughout the Bay Area, in the church and professionally. As his father always said, “Little Red, just do yo thang”.
MASAKO GERHARDT, Keyboards
Masako, born and raised in Tokyo Japan, where she started playing and studying the marimba at age 3, and the piano at age 5. She started to play professionally when she was 20 years old.
Masako, became a well known and very popular solo pianist playing in hotels and restaurants, primarily in Tokyo, Japan. Four years ago she decided to come to the United States to pursue her studies in jazz piano and to perform in small group jazz ensembles. She is very active in the Bay Area as a Jazz pianist. As more musicians and jazz audiences hear her perform she gains in popularity.
VINCENT TOLLIVER, Viola
Vincent Tolliver, viola player is a musician who is comfortable in any genre of music. He was born and raised in Columbus, GA and started playing the violin at the age of nine. After three years he switched to the viola because of its’ larger and soulful sound. He started playing in professional orchestras at the age of thirteen (13) and is a former member of The Columbus (GA), Middle Georgia, and Baton Rouge Symphonies.
Vincent received his Bachelor of Music in Viola Performance from The Louisiana State University School of Music and his Music Teacher Credential from Holy Names College. He has had the honor of performing as a soloist and sideman with Alvin Batiste of New Orleans, Denise Perrier, Ricardo Scales, Richard Howell, Kash Killion, Khalil Shaheed, Wayne Wallace and numerous other jazz and world music performers in the Bay Area. He is the former music director of award winning instrumental and choral ensembles at Alameda High School and Oakland Public Schools.
Vincent presently teaches general music, choir, and jazz band at Redwood Day School in Oakland, Ca where he has resided for the last sixteen (16) years. Audiences are drawn to Vince’s strong stage presence and expressive playing. He creates many fans for jazz string playing because he plays with a funk and soul that comes from doing R&B requests on his back porch as a child for his family and neighbors, gigging in a teen-age funk band, and singing/playing for church in which he is still active.
Musicians and singers enjoy Vince’s artistry because besides being a moving soloist he has the ability to enhance the artistry of others.
LESTER COBB, Drummer, Percussionist, Composer & Visual Artist
Lester, born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1941, his interest in music dates from his childhood. His father, a well-known blues musician (guitar and vocalist) in south Alabama in the thirties, was one of his first influences along with his mother, who sang in church and liked to listen to all types of music on the radio. These early exposures together with his formal training form the basis of Cobb’s spiritually inspired playing. At the age of seventeen (17), Cobb started a church band for young people. Bassist, James Swine, who played in the Jimmy Chappell Big Band, assisted him. Not long after, when Chappell’s drummer moved to New York, Swine—who thought Cobb had the makings of a big band drummer—talked Cobb’s parents into allowing him to join the band. Thus, Cobb’s professional career began.
After playing at the edge of the cultural tradition for a few years and studying with W.W. Handy (W.C. Handy’s nephew), Cobb attended Miles College in Birmingham, where he continued his music studies. When the Civil Rights movement was at its high point in the early sixties, Cobb became one of the key figures in the Birmingham youth movement. Cobb changed the look of bands in Birmingham by being the first to play in desegregated groups, which he called “human race bands.” Over the next sixteen (16) years, Cobb played with Ralph Williams, James Brown, Big Joe Williams, Kenny Durham, Stanley T. and Shirley Scott, Barry Harris, Kenny Burrell, Jaki Byard, Stanley Cowell, Frank Foster, Eddie Bert, Bob Cranshaw, Frank Waldron, Joe Newman, and many others. In addition to jazz, Cobb played European “Classical”, rock, country and western, commercial, folk and sacred music. Cobb likes to build on his formal training and the influences of drummers like Max Roach, Art Blakey, Elvin Jones, Joe Jones, Gene Krupa, and Earl Palmer.
Between 1967 and 1992, Cobb lived in New York, attended New York State University and worked as a Social Worker, Psychotherapist, Artist, and Television Producer. He continued to play with his own and other bands. In the eighties, he founded the Drum Academy, where he taught the art of communicating with drums. He became a solo performer, composing and working in an improvisational avant-garde idiom. He combined narrative and dance with the full range of percussion instruments, to which mix he eventually added instruments other than percussion.
Since 1992, when Cobb moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, he has played solo concerts, performed with his own group and with big bands – David Hardeman and others – and numerous smaller ensembles, including Ed Kelly and Hanif and the Sound Voyagers. Cobb’s original approach to playing drums is both melodic and spiritual. His 1998 premiere performance at Yoshi’s incorporated traditional jazz with materials drawn from Native American and Asian traditions in music and dance.
JUSTIN HELLMAN, Bass
Justin Hellman has a bachelor’s degree in music from UC Berkeley, where he studied with Steve Coleman and Henry Threadgill. He has also studied privately with Michael Manring, Kai Eckhardt, and Stephen Tramontozzi for several years.
He has performed at countless venues in the Bay Area including the Sweetwater, the Boom Boom Room, and at the High Sierra Music Festival. Over the years, Hellman has performed with Bay Area greats like saxophonist Paul McCandless, bassoonist Paul Hansen, and guitarist Will Bernard. His creativity and energy on acoustic and electric bass make him an exciting young voice within many genres of improvisational music.
Listen to "SUGAR"--A Live Performance by Clicking Here
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