Ted Rosenthal
Encyclopedia
Ted Rosenthal is an American
jazz
pianist
. He has worked with jazz legends such as Gerry Mulligan
and was featured on David Sanborn
's series Night Music, in addition to releasing several critically acclaimed CDs of his own. He has gone on to perform worldwide, both as a leader and as a sideman with many jazz greats, including Gerry Mulligan
, Art Farmer
, Phil Woods
, Bob Brookmeyer
, and Jon Faddis
. Rosenthal also has released ten CDs as a leader, which include new treatments and "derangements" of great American standards, jazz tunes and classical themes, as well as his original compositions. His ability to communicate both the creative and analytical aspects of jazz translates from the bandstand to the educational arena: he holds faculty positions at The Juilliard School
, Manhattan School of Music
, and The New School University.
, NY. He began playing by ear at a young age, and started studying at 12 with Tony Aless
, a sideman with Charlie Parker and Stan Getz. In high school, he studied briefly with Jaki Byard and Lennie Tristano, and he attended workshops with Billy Taylor
, Woody Shaw
and others.
Although jazz was Rosenthal's main passion, at the time there were limited opportunities to study jazz at the conservatory level. Since he also found satisfaction and joy in classical music, he pursued classical piano studies at Manhattan School of Music. He received Bachelors and Masters Degrees in piano performance while continuing to pursue his love of jazz outside the classroom. After college, he continued his classical piano studies with Phillip Kawin while playing jazz in and around New York.
Rosenthal was the winner of the Thelonious Monk
International Jazz Competition in 1988, which launched his career as a solo artist, leading to the release of his first CD as a leader. New Tunes, New Traditions, featuring now-legendary personnel Ron Carter
, Billy Higgins
and Tom Harrell
, interweaves music of Thelonious Monk with Rosenthal’s original compositions.
Ted toured in the early 1990s with the last Gerry Mulligan Quartet, recording three CDs with Mulligan and performed in major jazz festivals throughout the world. One critic noted, “The rapport of the (Mulligan) group was amazing, particularly Gerry’s telepathic communication with outstanding pianist Ted Rosenthal.... The byplay with Rosenthal left me with my jaw hanging down.” (Gene Lees, The Jazz Letter.) After Mulligan's death, Ted became musical director of The Gerry Mulligan All Star Tribute Band, featuring Lee Konitz, Bob Brookmeyer and Randy Brecker. The group’s CD, Thank You, Gerry!, was nominated for a Grammy award in 1998.
As a sideman, Ted has performed in small groups led by Art Farmer
, Jon Faddis
, Phil Woods
, and Jay Leonhart
. He has also performed with Wynton Marsalis
and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, The Carnegie Hall
Jazz Band and The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra. Rosenthal is the pianist of choice for many top jazz vocalists including Helen Merrill
, Mark Murphy
and Ann Hampton Callaway
. Serving on the faculty at both the Juilliard School
and Manhattan School of Music in New York City, he is also a member of the Juilliard Jazz Quintet.
Rosenthals’s CDs as a leader showcase both his creative approach to standards and classics as well as his original compositions. His latest, The King and I (2006), features Rosenthal's jazz takes (with George Mraz - bass, Lewis Nash - drums) on songs from the classic musical. One Night in Vermont (2004), a duo performance with trombonist Bob Brookmeyer
, explores great American standards in an unusually inventive and improvisatory style.
Rosenthal regularly performs in jazz piano concerts, including at the 92nd Street Y with Bill Charlap
and Dick Hyman. At the 2003 JVC Jazz Festival, Ted performed in, and co-produced with George Wein
, “Piano Starts Here,” also featuring Kenny Barron
, Cedar Walton
, and others. Ted has also appeared on Marian McPartland
's Piano Jazz
on National Public Radio and on NBC’s Night Music with David Sanborn.
A recipient of three grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Rosenthal currently composes large-scale works as well as jazz tunes. The Survivor, a concerto for piano and orchestra that combines written and improvised sections for the soloist, has been performed by Ted with the Rockland Symphony and with the Manhattan Jazz Philharmonic. Ted often adds improvisations to his performances of Gershwin's works for piano and orchestra, adding an extra dimension of vitality and spontaneity to the music.
Ted’s classical/jazz crossover performances include solo and featured appearances with The Boston Pops, The Baltimore Symphony, The Kansas City Symphony, The Rochester Philharmonic, The Indianapolis Symphony, The Tucson Symphony, and The Greater Palm Beach Symphony. His latest work includes adapting themes by Brahms, Schumann
, Tchaikovsky and others into a mainstream jazz idiom.
Rosenthal is active in jazz education. He presents jazz clinics throughout the world, often in association with his touring. He was a contributing editor for Piano and Keyboard magazine and has published piano arrangements and feature articles for Piano Today and The Piano Stylist.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
. He has worked with jazz legends such as Gerry Mulligan
Gerry Mulligan
Gerald Joseph "Gerry" Mulligan was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, composer and arranger. Though Mulligan is primarily known as one of the leading baritone saxophonists in jazz history – playing the instrument with a light and airy tone in the era of cool jazz – he was also...
and was featured on David Sanborn
David Sanborn
David Sanborn is an American alto saxophonist. Though Sanborn has worked in many genres, his solo recordings typically blend jazz with instrumental pop and R&B. He released his first solo album Taking Off in 1975, but has been playing the saxophone since before he was in high school...
's series Night Music, in addition to releasing several critically acclaimed CDs of his own. He has gone on to perform worldwide, both as a leader and as a sideman with many jazz greats, including Gerry Mulligan
Gerry Mulligan
Gerald Joseph "Gerry" Mulligan was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, composer and arranger. Though Mulligan is primarily known as one of the leading baritone saxophonists in jazz history – playing the instrument with a light and airy tone in the era of cool jazz – he was also...
, Art Farmer
Art Farmer
Arthur Stewart "Art" Farmer was an American jazz trumpeter and flugelhorn player. He also played flumpet, a trumpet/flugelhorn combination designed for him by David Monette. His identical twin brother, Addison Farmer Arthur Stewart "Art" Farmer (August 21, 1928, Council Bluffs, Iowa –...
, Phil Woods
Phil Woods
Philip Wells Woods is an American jazz bebop alto saxophonist, clarinetist, bandleader and composer.-Biography:...
, Bob Brookmeyer
Bob Brookmeyer
Robert Brookmeyer is an American jazz valve trombonist, pianist, arranger, and composer.-Biography:Born in Kansas City, Missouri, Brookmeyer first gained widespread public attention as a member of Gerry Mulligan's quartet from 1954 to 1957. He later worked with Jimmy Giuffre...
, and Jon Faddis
Jon Faddis
Jon Faddis is an American jazz trumpet player, conductor, composer, and educator renowned for both his highly virtuosic command of the instrument and for his expertise in the field of music education...
. Rosenthal also has released ten CDs as a leader, which include new treatments and "derangements" of great American standards, jazz tunes and classical themes, as well as his original compositions. His ability to communicate both the creative and analytical aspects of jazz translates from the bandstand to the educational arena: he holds faculty positions at The Juilliard School
Juilliard School
The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...
, Manhattan School of Music
Manhattan School of Music
The Manhattan School of Music is a major music conservatory located on the Upper West Side of New York City. The school offers degrees on the bachelors, masters, and doctoral levels in the areas of classical and jazz performance and composition...
, and The New School University.
Biography
Rosenthal was born and raised in Great Neck, Long IslandLong Island
Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...
, NY. He began playing by ear at a young age, and started studying at 12 with Tony Aless
Tony Aless
Anthony Alessandrini, better known by his stage name Tony Aless was an American jazz pianist....
, a sideman with Charlie Parker and Stan Getz. In high school, he studied briefly with Jaki Byard and Lennie Tristano, and he attended workshops with Billy Taylor
Billy Taylor
Billy Taylor was an American jazz pianist, composer, broadcaster and educator. He was the Robert L. Jones Distinguished Professor of Music at East Carolina University in Greenville, and since 1994, he was the artistic director for jazz at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in...
, Woody Shaw
Woody Shaw
Woody Shaw was an American jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist, cornetist, composer and band leader, often referred to as the "last innovator" in the jazz trumpet lineage...
and others.
Although jazz was Rosenthal's main passion, at the time there were limited opportunities to study jazz at the conservatory level. Since he also found satisfaction and joy in classical music, he pursued classical piano studies at Manhattan School of Music. He received Bachelors and Masters Degrees in piano performance while continuing to pursue his love of jazz outside the classroom. After college, he continued his classical piano studies with Phillip Kawin while playing jazz in and around New York.
Rosenthal was the winner of the Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Sphere Monk was an American jazz pianist and composer considered "one of the giants of American music". Monk had a unique improvisational style and made numerous contributions to the standard jazz repertoire, including "Epistrophy", "'Round Midnight", "Blue Monk", "Straight, No Chaser"...
International Jazz Competition in 1988, which launched his career as a solo artist, leading to the release of his first CD as a leader. New Tunes, New Traditions, featuring now-legendary personnel Ron Carter
Ron Carter
Ron Carter is an American jazz double-bassist. His appearances on over 2,500 albums make him one of the most-recorded bassists in jazz history, along with Milt Hinton, Ray Brown and Leroy Vinnegar. Carter is also an acclaimed cellist who has recorded numerous times on that...
, Billy Higgins
Billy Higgins
Billy Higgins was an American jazz drummer. He played mainly free jazz and hard bop.Higgins was born in Los Angeles, California. Higgins played on Ornette Coleman's first records, beginning in 1958...
and Tom Harrell
Tom Harrell
Tom Harrell is a renowned American post-bop jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist, composer and arranger.-Biography:Tom Harrell was born in Urbana, Illinois but moved to the San Francisco Bay Area at the age of five. He started playing trumpet at eight and within five years, started playing gigs with...
, interweaves music of Thelonious Monk with Rosenthal’s original compositions.
Ted toured in the early 1990s with the last Gerry Mulligan Quartet, recording three CDs with Mulligan and performed in major jazz festivals throughout the world. One critic noted, “The rapport of the (Mulligan) group was amazing, particularly Gerry’s telepathic communication with outstanding pianist Ted Rosenthal.... The byplay with Rosenthal left me with my jaw hanging down.” (Gene Lees, The Jazz Letter.) After Mulligan's death, Ted became musical director of The Gerry Mulligan All Star Tribute Band, featuring Lee Konitz, Bob Brookmeyer and Randy Brecker. The group’s CD, Thank You, Gerry!, was nominated for a Grammy award in 1998.
As a sideman, Ted has performed in small groups led by Art Farmer
Art Farmer
Arthur Stewart "Art" Farmer was an American jazz trumpeter and flugelhorn player. He also played flumpet, a trumpet/flugelhorn combination designed for him by David Monette. His identical twin brother, Addison Farmer Arthur Stewart "Art" Farmer (August 21, 1928, Council Bluffs, Iowa –...
, Jon Faddis
Jon Faddis
Jon Faddis is an American jazz trumpet player, conductor, composer, and educator renowned for both his highly virtuosic command of the instrument and for his expertise in the field of music education...
, Phil Woods
Phil Woods
Philip Wells Woods is an American jazz bebop alto saxophonist, clarinetist, bandleader and composer.-Biography:...
, and Jay Leonhart
Jay Leonhart
Jay Leonhart is a noted bassist and songwriter working in jazz and popular music. He has performed with diverse artists including Judy Garland, Carly Simon, Bucky Pizzarelli, Sting, and Frank Sinatra...
. He has also performed with Wynton Marsalis
Wynton Marsalis
Wynton Learson Marsalis is a trumpeter, composer, bandleader, music educator, and Artistic Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. Marsalis has promoted the appreciation of classical and jazz music often to young audiences...
and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, The Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
Jazz Band and The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra. Rosenthal is the pianist of choice for many top jazz vocalists including Helen Merrill
Helen Merrill
Helen Merrill is an internationally known jazz vocalist.Merrill's recording career has spanned six decades and she is popular with fans of jazz in Japan and Italy as well as in her native United States...
, Mark Murphy
Mark Murphy (singer)
Mark Murphy is an American jazz singer based in New York. He is most noted for his definitive and unique vocalese and vocal improvisations with both melody and lyrics...
and Ann Hampton Callaway
Ann Hampton Callaway
Ann Hampton Callaway is a multiplatinum-selling singer, composer, lyricist, pianist, and actress. She is best known for writing and singing the theme to the TV series The Nanny, writing songs for Barbra Streisand and starring in the Broadway musical Swing!.-Career:Callaway was described by the New...
. Serving on the faculty at both the Juilliard School
Juilliard School
The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...
and Manhattan School of Music in New York City, he is also a member of the Juilliard Jazz Quintet.
Rosenthals’s CDs as a leader showcase both his creative approach to standards and classics as well as his original compositions. His latest, The King and I (2006), features Rosenthal's jazz takes (with George Mraz - bass, Lewis Nash - drums) on songs from the classic musical. One Night in Vermont (2004), a duo performance with trombonist Bob Brookmeyer
Bob Brookmeyer
Robert Brookmeyer is an American jazz valve trombonist, pianist, arranger, and composer.-Biography:Born in Kansas City, Missouri, Brookmeyer first gained widespread public attention as a member of Gerry Mulligan's quartet from 1954 to 1957. He later worked with Jimmy Giuffre...
, explores great American standards in an unusually inventive and improvisatory style.
Rosenthal regularly performs in jazz piano concerts, including at the 92nd Street Y with Bill Charlap
Bill Charlap
William Morrison Charlap is a jazz pianist born October 15, 1966 in New York City.Bill Charlap comes from a musical background and is a distant cousin to famed jazz pianist Dick Hyman. His mother, Sandy Stewart , is a singer who had a hit in 1962 with My Coloring Book, while his father was Broadway...
and Dick Hyman. At the 2003 JVC Jazz Festival, Ted performed in, and co-produced with George Wein
George Wein
George Wein is an American jazz promoter and producer who has been called "the most famous jazz impresario" and "the most important non-player... in jazz history"...
, “Piano Starts Here,” also featuring Kenny Barron
Kenny Barron
Kenny Barron , is an American jazz pianist. He is the younger brother of tenor saxophonist Bill Barron, and known for his lyrical, adaptive style.-Biography:...
, Cedar Walton
Cedar Walton
Cedar Anthony Walton, Junior is an American hard bop jazz pianist.-Biography:Walton grew up in Dallas, Texas. His mother was an aspiring concert pianist, and was Walton's initial teacher. She also took him to jazz performances around Dallas...
, and others. Ted has also appeared on Marian McPartland
Marian McPartland
Margaret Marian McPartland, OBE is an English-born jazz pianist, composer, writer, and the host of Marian McPartland's Piano Jazz on National Public Radio, NPR.-Early life:...
's Piano Jazz
Piano Jazz
Piano Jazz is a weekly one hour radio show produced and distributed by National Public Radio. It began on June 4, 1978 and has always been hosted by jazz pianist Marian McPartland. It is the longest running cultural program on NPR. The show features a single guest, and usually consists of about an...
on National Public Radio and on NBC’s Night Music with David Sanborn.
A recipient of three grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Rosenthal currently composes large-scale works as well as jazz tunes. The Survivor, a concerto for piano and orchestra that combines written and improvised sections for the soloist, has been performed by Ted with the Rockland Symphony and with the Manhattan Jazz Philharmonic. Ted often adds improvisations to his performances of Gershwin's works for piano and orchestra, adding an extra dimension of vitality and spontaneity to the music.
Ted’s classical/jazz crossover performances include solo and featured appearances with The Boston Pops, The Baltimore Symphony, The Kansas City Symphony, The Rochester Philharmonic, The Indianapolis Symphony, The Tucson Symphony, and The Greater Palm Beach Symphony. His latest work includes adapting themes by Brahms, Schumann
Robert Schumann
Robert Schumann, sometimes known as Robert Alexander Schumann, was a German composer, aesthete and influential music critic. He is regarded as one of the greatest and most representative composers of the Romantic era....
, Tchaikovsky and others into a mainstream jazz idiom.
Rosenthal is active in jazz education. He presents jazz clinics throughout the world, often in association with his touring. He was a contributing editor for Piano and Keyboard magazine and has published piano arrangements and feature articles for Piano Today and The Piano Stylist.
External links
- [ All Music]