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Heralded as one of the breakout artists of his generation, jazz saxophonist Chris Potter will lead his quartet in a concert 8 p.m. today at the Williams Center for the Arts.
Tickets cost $4 with Lafayette ID and $15 for the public. They may be purchased by calling the box office at 610-330-5009.
Prior to the concert, Potter will lead a clinic for young jazz musicians at 4 p.m. in the Williams Center.
His band includes keyboardist Kevin Hayes, bassist Scott Colley, and drummer Bill Stewart.
“As an improviser, Potter challenges himself and the listener – he rarely plays licks, instead always inventing, veering off into new vistas,” writes Stereophile.
“With his effusive, warm-sounding horn and wealth of ideas, Potter is the guy everyone wants to play with,” notes The Ottawa Citizen.
Potter last visited the Williams Center three years ago in a performance with Dave Holland’s band. Dubbed “easily the most compelling saxophonist of his generation,” by the Detroit Free Press, he is one of the busiest and most respected players in modern jazz. Potter tours and records with the bands of Holland and Dave Douglas and has drawn considerable attention for his work with them, with Mingus Big Band, and guest performances with Nnenna Freelon, Ray Brown, James Moody, Joanne Brackeen, and many others. His debut Verve recording as a leader, Gratitude, featured tributes to the pantheon of American saxophonists to whom Potter orients his own work — among them Coltrane, Shorter, Hawkins, and Rollins.
Potter has been a double winner in the DownBeat magazine International Critics Poll. Voted number one tenor saxophonist in the “Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition” category, he also tied for the top spot as “Best Soprano Saxophonist” in the “TDWR” field. Some of the ballots for Potter doubtless came as a result of his contributions to the gold-record success of Steely Dan’s Grammy-nominated Two Against Nature.
Raised in Columbia, S.C., Potter moved to New York at 18 to study at the Manhattan School. While a student, he began playing with Red Rodney’s band. His resume includes tours and recordings with Jim Hall, Ray Brown, James Moody, Steve Swallow, Larry Carlton, Paul Motian, and others. The youngest musician ever to receive the prestigious Danish Jazzpar Prize, Potter’s work on Joanne Brackeen’s Pink Elephant Magic earned him a Grammy nomination for Best Jazz Instrumental Solo.
The nationally recognized Performance Series attracts more than 10,000 people each season. It has been cited for performing excellence by National Endowment for the Arts, National Dance Project, Chamber Music America, Lila Wallace Reader’s Digest Fund, Pennsylvania Arts and Humanities Councils, and Association of Performing Arts Presenters.
The 2002-03 Performance Series at Lafayette is supported in part by gifts from Friends of the Williams Center for the Arts; by the F.M. Kirby Foundation; by provisions of the Alan and Wendy Pesky Artist-in-Residence Program, the James Bradley Fund, and the Ed Brunswick Jazz Fund; and by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation, Pennsylvania Performing Arts on Tour, and New England Foundation for the Arts.