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Skip Wilkins, assistant professor of music, and his quintet will hold a number of upcoming performances to promote his latest project and the first CD in a two-album package, Skip Wilkins Quintet: Volume I. The work was released by Dreambox Media in September.
Wilkins will discuss and perform songs from the new CD during a free brown bag preview 12 – 1 p.m. Friday, Nov. 17 in the WilliamsCenter for the Arts room 123.
The Skip Wilkins Quintet will then perform 8 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 19 at the WilliamsCenter. The event is free and open to the public.
Another performance in promotion of the new CD will be 7 p.m. Friday, Dec. 1, at the Deer Head Inn, 5 Main St., Delaware Water Gap, Pa. There is a $12 entrance fee. For reservations call the inn at (570) 424-2000.
Recorded over two days in May 2005 on stage at the WilliamsCenter, the album features contemporary, original music by Wilkins from the 1990s up to the early 2000s. It is a live remote recording, meaning it was recorded outside a traditional studio without an audience. He and his group also recorded “Skip Wilkins Quintet: Volume II” at the same time; that album is scheduled for release in the spring.
In addition to Wilkins on piano, recording and performing musicians include Paul Kendall on tenor saxophone, Tom Kozic on guitar, Tony Marino on bass, and Gary Rissmiller on drums.
Joining the Lafayette faculty full-time in 2001, Wilkins received a fellowship from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts for excellence in jazz composition. His music has received positive reviews from the Philadelphia Inquirer, Detroit Free Press, Morning Call, Express Times, Improvijazzation, and 52nd Street Jazz. He has performed at acclaimed venues such as the Deer Head Inn, Blue Orchid Inn, Allentown Symphony Hall, Wichita Jazz Festival, and Tavern on the Green. Previously, Wilkins taught at University of Northern Colorado, spending many of his eight years there in the nationally acclaimed jazz studies program. He earned a B.A. from College of the Holy Cross and a M.A. from University of NorthernColorado. He also studied jazz composition and arrangement with Herb Pomeroy at Berklee College of Music in Boston, where he was a faculty member.