Guitar-trumpet lineup plays legendary Washington DC club for two shows, Monday October 25

	Berklee Monterey Quartet Audio • Love Sweeps Over the City (Composed by Nir Felder) Listen: slow | fast

BOSTON, October 8, 2004 —The first college to offer an education based on the aesthetic and ethos of jazz, Boston's Berklee College of Music is proud to present the Berklee Monterey Quartet at Blues Alley in Washington DC, on Monday, October 25, 2004. Each fall, the Quartet brings together four of Berklee's finest students to perform at the Monterey Jazz Festival, creating a kind of sonic window into the pioneering Boston music college. This will be the Quartet's first-ever performance at Blues Alley.

With graduation still ahead, the members of the Quartet are already highly sought after, with dozens of top-name professional credits, major awards, and concerts. Leader and guitarist Nir Felder is the recipient of the Billboard Magazine Endowed Scholarship, presented each year to Berklee's most promising, upper-semester student, as well as the college's Jimi Hendrix Award.

Trumpeter Christian Scott is another rising star, and with Felder, forms a guitar and trumpet front line that elicits echoes of Miles' "Man With The Horn" period, while a clear nod to drum and bass and electronica can also be heard. The group strives to create beauty, and to make jazz with, as New Yorker scribe Whitney Balliett once called it, "the sound of surprise."

Press: to inquire about photo availability and usage, please e-mail us. The Berklee Monterey Quartet 2004. From left: Christian Scott, trumpet; Nick Falk, drums; Luques Curtis, bass; Nir Felder, guitar and leader. Photo by Nick Balkin

The Berklee Monterey Quartet 2004

Nir Felder '05 (Katonah, New York), Guitar, and Leader
New York-born Nir Felder has been fascinated by music since age thirteen, when he first picked up the guitar. After years as a self-taught player, Nir enrolled at Berklee and seriously began studying jazz improvisation and composition. Currently in his fourth year, Nir has had the good fortune to play and study with such legendary musicians as John Scofield, Joe Lovano, Pat Metheny, and Hal Crook. In May, he was chosen to perform at the Blue Note with the Berklee Scholarship Jazz Ensemble, directed by Yoron Israel, and this summer Nir played the JVC/New York and Caramoor Festivals, with the Berklee Rainbow Band. In addition to the prestigious Billboard Endowed Scholarship, Nir was also recently awarded the Jimi Hendrix Award, awarded to the college's most promising guitarist, from Berklee's Guitar Department.

Christian Scott '04 (New Orleans, LA) Trumpet
A native of New Orleans, Christian Scott has successfully absorbed the rich musical heritage of his family. After receiving a trumpet as a gift from his mother and grandmother at age 12, he began to explore his talents, under the tutelage of his uncle, modern jazz innovator, saxophonist Donald Harrison, Jr. (Berklee '80)

In addition to continuing his musical education with his uncle, Christian also attended the prestigious New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (NOCCA), where he studied under the direction of Clyde Kerr and Kent Jordan. Other noted alumni include Harrison, Harry Connick, Jr., the Marsalises, Terence Blanchard, and Nicholas Payton. Upon graduation, Christian was awarded the highest honor of all his classmates.

Christian received a full tuition scholarship to attend Berklee, where he is now a senior. Now a member of Harrison's ensemble, he has performed with the group throughout Europe, Asia and South, Central, and North America. He appears on Harrison's Real Life Stories and Kind of New, a tribute to Miles Davis' Kind of Blue. In the spring of 2004, Christian was selected for a Berklee student quintet recording project, which was produced by Pat Metheny and Gary Burton. He recently led his own sextet in performance at the Montreux Jazz Festival.

Luques Curtis '04 (Hartford, CT) Bass
Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Luques studies at Berklee with John Lockwood and Dave Santoro, on a full scholarship. He was introduced to jazz as a member of the Artists Collective Youth Orchestra. From 1997 through 2000, Luques attended the Greater Hartford Academy of the Performing Arts, during which time he studied with Santoro and Paul Brown, and performed at the Havana Jazz Festival. He also studied classical bass at the HARTT School of Music with Volkan Orhan and Latin bass with Andy Gonzalez and Carlos Del Puerto.

At Berklee, Luques has performed with the Hal Crook Band, Phil Wilson's Rainbow All-Stars, and the college's Art Blakey Ensemble, and he is a winner of a DownBeat Student Music Award. In only his sophomore year, Luques was invited by Donald Harrison to be a member of his quintet and has performed on tour with Harrison at jazz festivals in Spain, Holland, Germany, Switzerland and New Orleans among other venues. He also has performed with the Christian Scott Sextet in New Orleans, and at the Montreux Jazz Festival. Luques has recently completed several festival and club dates, including the Blue Note in New York, in Gary Burton's "Generations" band. In November, he'll be recording with Burton for his next Concord Records CD.

Nick Falk '06 (Cape Elizabeth, Maine) Drums
Nick is a Performance major at Berklee where he has studied percussion with Bob Gulloti, Hal Crook, John Ramsay, Ralph Peterson, Ian Froman, Jon Hazilla, and Dave Samuels. He has performed at the Maine Jazz Festival two years, opening for Dave Brubeck and Cleo Laine. He has also performed on Maine Public Radio with many acts, including the Tom Snow trio and his own group, the Seahorse Project.

He is a member of the student trombone supergroup Against the Grain (ATG), winners of the Eastern Trombone Workshop Competition for Jazz Ensemble and runners up in the International Trombone Association Competition. ATG has been featured in issues of Jazziz, and on the Jazziz CD, and recently performed at the North Sea Jazz Festival. Nick has performed with George Garzone, and Franco Pinna and currently performs throughout New England with numerous groups.

Berklee College of Music was founded on the revolutionary principle that the best way to prepare students for careers in music was through the study and practice of contemporary music. For over half a century, the college has evolved constantly to reflect the state of the art of music and the music business. With over a dozen performance and nonperformance majors, a diverse and talented student body representing over 70 countries, and a music industry "who's who" of alumni, Berklee is the world's premier learning lab for the music of today — and tomorrow.

For editorial information, the media may contact:

Rob Hayes
617-747-2566
rhayes@berklee.edu

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