Brian Melvin, Søren Lee, Mads Søndergaard
Biography Brian Melvin, Søren Lee, Mads Søndergaard
Brian Melvin
Drumming legend Brian Melvin will bring an allstar quintet to The Falcon on March 12. Brian has played and recorded 6 records with Hall of fame bassist Jaco Pastorius along with playing and recording with Joe Henderson. John Scofield. Mike Stern. Michael Brecker and his group Beatlejazz. Brian has also played and recorded with Bob Weir of The Grateful Dead and has made two cds with pianist Jeff Chimenti of Dead and Company in Brians group FOG. For this specisl show Brians quintet will feature Danny Walsh on Sax. Tim Hegarty on Sax. Soren Lee on Guitar and Arthur Kell on Bass.
Drummer- and Percussionist Brian Melvin is a native San Franciscan who now resides in Tallinn Estonia. Brian has played and recorded with many of the jazz and Rock legends including The great Jaco Pastorius with whom they recorded 5 records together and one called Nightfood featuring Bob Weir of The Grateful Dead. Brian also has played and recorded with Joe Henderson- Mike Stern-John Scofield- Michael Brecker- Joe Lovano and many other legends. Brian is co-leader of Beatlejazz with 3 time grammy winning pianist David Kikoski. Beatlejazz has recorded 4 top ten CDs internationally. Brian is also leader of the group FOG which has recorded 4 CDs and has one out currently featuring Jeff Chimenti of Dead and Company.
Søren Lee
Born January 20, 1966 in Copenhagen) is a Danish Jazz guitarist and composer. He started playing guitar at age of 10, took guitar lessons for about two years with a private teacher and began his professional career at 15. He performed with his own band in smaller places around Copenhagen. At 16 he started playing with the funk band “Tonight” that Achieved big success around Denmark played around 4 gigs a week in two years. At 19 he started playing with the Jazz group Orbits with Uffe Markussen sax, Alex Riel (Drums) Ben Besiakow (piano) Marilyn Mazur (perc.) among others, and got his first review as a jazz guitarist with this band in the newspaper Politiken after playing in Jazz club Montmartre headline was “Great talent, Danish guitar hope”. (By Boris Rabinowich).
In summer 1988-90 Søren packed his bags and went for the big Apple New York to try it out and also to study music at New School for jazz and social research.
In 1990 he records his first solo Album with the legendary bass player Ray Brown, “Søren Lee Quartet “ Ray Brown bass, Alvin Queen Drums, Niels Lan Doky/Thomas Clausen Piano. The band toured and played sold out concert nationwide, and attracted serious media attention, incl. front pages and national television documentary and full broadcast concerts.
Søren Lee performed in 1991 with Jim Hall quartet at Village Vanguard New York, and was also feat. with Jim hall quartet at Montmartre the same year.
In 1992 he recorded his second solo Album Søren Lee Trio with Adam Nussbaum on Drums and Jesper Lundgaard on bass. This trio album received many great reviews: “Briliant guitar talent Søren Lee is a formidable guitarist nothing less. (Jyllands Posten)”. This trio toured all over Scandinavia.
Mads Søndergaard
began his jazz adventures in legendary jazz bar “Bent J” in his hometown Aarhus. In 1998 he moved to Holland to study piano at the Royal Conservatory in the Hague from which he graduated in 2003. After moving to Copenhagen he started playing with a wide range of danish jazz musicians and has endeavoured into ragtime, stride and bebop as well as playing singer/songwriter, bossa, pop and pretty much anything in between. Mads also plays the hammond organ and accordion
