Contact: Golda Solomon, 877-529-9528, or gs@goldajazz.com

Cornelia Street Café: corneliastreetcafe@earthlink.net

For immediate release

Po’Jazz at The Cornelia Street Cafe

Poetry in Partnership with Jazz

Thursday, December 16^th, 2004 6 - 8 p.m.

Vocalist Andrea Wolper, bassist Ken Filiano, and a holiday stocking full of poets celebrate jazz great J.D. Parran’s birthday this month at Po’Jazz, the one-of-a-kind jazz and poetry series at The Cornelia Street Café. The performance will take place Downstairs at the Café at 6:00 on December 16th in Po’Jazz’s third Thursday evening of the month slot. The downstairs room opens at 5:30 for early dining and imbibing (serving the same fine food as upstairs). Admission is $15 ($13 students/seniors), which includes one drink.

Poet and host Golda Solomon, “The Medicine Woman of Jazz,” welcomes a cornucopia of Po’Jazz favorites and newcomers including Monique Avakian, Alana Free, Susan Horowitz, Denise Utt, Chris Gorman, Dorothy Saracino, Pam Stone, A.J. Muhammad, Jason Butler, and Tamiko.

The evening will also feature the Po’Jazz House Quartet, consisting of Eliot Cardinaux on piano, Adam Chilenski on bass, Bram Kincheloe on drums, and Daniel Levine on trumpet.

Golda’s unique brand of jazz-flavored poetry was featured this year at a pair of performances in Denver, Colorado, at the 92nd Street Y’s Makor Marathon, and at Mamapalooza 2004 at the Bowery Poetry Club. Her poetry has been described as having “a rhythm and spontaneity that goes right to the heart… (She) has found her perfect accompaniment in jazz” (Madeline Peters, President and founder of Poet’s Corner).

Po’Jazz is increasingly becoming “the place to be” every third Thursday. Gladys Serrano of Mutable Music says, “Po’Jazz at Cornelia Street is one big friendly party of good words, good sounds, and good food.” Performances are currently being recorded live for a new CD (expected release summer 2005).

This performance is part of a third Thursday of the month poetry and jazz series at The Cornelia Street Café programmed by ICAAN co-founder Golda Solomon in association with JazzJaunts (www.jazzjaunts.com). Dedicated to the belief that the arts are vital for tapping into processes needed for individual healing and community building, ICAAN (Interactive Communication and Arts Network) provides on-site arts programming to workplaces, schools and other organizations.

For more information about ICAAN, call 877-529-9528 or visit www.icaan.biz.

The Café is located at 29 Cornelia Street, Greenwich Village, NYC. Po’Jazz events take place in the café’s downstairs performance space. By subway, take the A, C, E, F or V train to West 4th Street, or the 1 or 9 train to Christopher Street - Sheridan Square (walk 2.5 blocks east on West 4th and make a right onto Cornelia Street.) By car, take 7th Avenue south to Bleecker; left on Bleecker; left onto Cornelia. For more information, visit www.corneliastreetcafe.com, or call 212-989-9319.

The Cornelia Street Café poetry series is curated by Angelo Verga. The next event in this series will be held on Thursday, February 17th, from 6 until 8.

Artist bios follow; e-mail info@icaan.biz for photos.

About the Artists

Monique Avakian, poet, regularly performs her “musical,” “inventive,” and “off the hook” poetry around Westchester and Manhattan. Her work has appeared in several poetry publications, and she has earned awards for both poetry and non-fiction. Whether teaching or performing, Monique seeks to spark everyone's intuitive love of language and natural enthusiasm for imaginative depth. www.moniqueavakian.com

Eliot Cardinaux, piano, is currently a first year jazz piano student at the Manhattan School of Music. He was born in Dayton, Ohio in 1984 and moved to New York in the fall of 2003. He began playing jazz piano at the age of 15.

Adam Chilenski, bass, is excited to be living in NYC. Having recently moved here from Portland, Maine he already considers it his home. Adam has been making a living as a musician since high school, and says he has no plans to do anything else.

Ken Filiano, bass, is one of the busiest bassists working today. He tours widely, with numerous festival and concert stage appearances across the United States, Canada, Europe, and South America. Ken's solo bass CD, Subvenire (NineWinds), received unanimous critical praise, and a first place mention in Cadence Magazine's poll of top releases of 2003. His collaborations with numerous artists, including Steve Adams, Rodrigo Amado and Carlos Zingaro, Vinny Golia, Richard Grossman, and Dom Minasi, have brought wide acclaim. He is a member of numerous ensembles as well as an in-demand sideman with a lengthy discography and performance CV. Along with new music concerts and solo excursions with poets and dancers, Ken has been a guest lecturer, performer, and workshop leader at institutions in the United States and beyond. Critics have called Ken a “creative virtuoso,” a “master of technique” . . . “a paradigm of that type of artist. . . who can play anything in any context and make it work, simply because he puts the music first and leaves peripheral considerations behind.”

Alana Free, poet, is the editor of The Mom Egg, the chapbook of Mamapalooza. She is a published writer and performer. She has performed her monologues at the Cutting Room, the Bowery Poetry Club, Cornelia Street Café and the C Note. Her current work Beginner At Life explores spirituality, sexuality and anorexia. Her art blends and reflects her environmental influences: the down-to-earth quality of Atlantic Canada, the intellectualism of the yeshiva world of Jerusalem, and the urban edginess of New York.

Susan “Dr. Sue” Horowitz, poet, is a singer/songwriter/actor/speaker/comedian/writer. Her clients include corporations, universities, hospitals, resorts, cruises, and private parties. She is the author of Queens of Comedy,based on interviews with well-known female comedians, and Boulevard X, an original, multicultural musical. Together with pianist Laura Perlman, her “New York Upbeats” provides customized entertainment for all occasions. She writes a syndicated humorous advice column, “Ask Dr. Sue,” and she has appeared on a number of radio and tv shows. Dr. Sue has released a cd of original songs, Celebrate Life! www.drsue.com

Bram Kincheloe, drums, has been playing music all of his life, starting drum lessons at the age of five and taking piano lessons from his mother. He has toured Japan twice with the Monterey Jazz Festival High School All Star Band, and visited Amsterdam twice to study at the Conservatory Von Amsterdam. Bram moved to New York at the age of 16 to study at the LaGuardia High School of Performing Arts, and, after one year, left to attend the Manhattan School of Music, where he is currently studying with Justin Dicioccio.

Daniel Levine, trumpet, grew up in New York City in a family of musicians. He started playing trumpet at age 11, and became interested in jazz 2 years later when he first heard Miles Davis and John Coltrane. After three years of high school, he dropped out to have more time to practice, play and enjoy the wealth of music in New York City, and began meeting the various musicians he would come to play with at Po’Jazz and elsewhere. He moved to Boston to study at the New England Conservatory for a year, then returned to New York, where he is currently attending the Manhattan School of Music and having a great time playing and digging music.

A. J. Muhammad, poet, has studied poetry with Jacqueline Johnson at the Frederick Douglass Creative Arts Center.  His work has been published in Minetta Review and two chapbooks (A Fickle Thread Called Love and Ambushed) written in collaboration with the Frederick Douglass Creative Arts Center Poetry Workshops in 2002 and 2003. A.J. has read at different poetry venues throughout the city.

J. D. Parran, reeds, is well-known as a player of the saxophone, clarinet and flute. For two decades his featured instrument has been the rarely-heard alto clarinet. A native of St. Louis, he was a member of the Black Artist Group (BAG). He has performed and/or recorded with Derek Bailey, Muhal Richard Abrams, Douglas Ewart, Quincy Troupe, Hamiet Bluiett, Lena Horne, Frank Foster, George E. Lewis, Leroy Jenkins, Don Byron and Julius Hemphill, among others, and is a member of the prestigious Me We & Them Orchestra led by James "Jabbo" Ware. Mr. Parran teaches at City University of New York and at The Harlem School of the Arts, where he has served as Music Department Chair and Director of Jazz and African-American Music Studies.

Dorothy Saracino, poet, is a former corporate exec turned entrepreneur now educator who always performs. Captured spotlight in fifth grade. Subsequent roles wife, mother and maid. Founder of choir Joyful Noise. Self-taught guitar skills employs. Trinity Player (cast of Godspel). Enlightenment attempts to sell. Rhyme savant propensity discovered mid-century. Half closed window motivation achieved goal of publication (American Song Magazine). Feminist director of project Womanvoice. Arts Council member---dangerous choice! Producer of Stand-Up...a tea (spoken word/poetry/music/song/comedy. Recently released debut CD (LaFamiglia).

Golda Solomon, “the medicine woman of jazz,” is a professor of communications, speech, and theater arts; a poet, performer, producer, and docent; a supporter of women musicians as well as young musicians, poets, and performers. She was project director of Po’Jazz at The Hudson Valley Writers’ Center for four years, and co-founded the brooklyn poetry choir. Golda has pioneered several unique businesses including JazzJaunts, a personalized jazz service, and, with Barbara Sfraga, ICAAN (Interactive Communication and Arts Network), which provides innovative, on-site, organization-specific arts programming to workplaces, schools, and other organizations. Golda has a collection of poetry, Flatbush Cowgirl, published in 1999, for which she co-produced a companion CD, First Set. She also co-produced the CD Po’Jazz: Takin’ It To The Hollow, which includes over 20 poets and musicians. In 2002, Golda's poetry won first prize at the Writer's Workshop in Asheville, North Carolina. Her book and CDs are available on www.amazon.com and www.jazzjaunts.com.

Denise Utt, poet, comes to New York from Seattle. She is both lyricist and poet. Her poetry inspires her R&B songwriting. She has written lyrics for Angela Bofield and Hank Crawford. Her poetry has the movement of rhythm and blues.

Andrea Wolper, vocalist and poet, continues to draw the attention of audiences and critics with her fine vocal and interpretive abilities. She has appeared in jazz rooms and in concert halls in the New York area and across the country, including the Donne in Musica Festival (Italy), Greater Hartford Festival of Jazz, Fairfax (CA) Jazz Festival, First Night New York, two JVC Jazz Festival (New York) Special Concerts, Many Colors of a Woman Jazz Concert, and, by special invitation, in “A Singers Celebration” at the Blue Note in New York, joining an impressive roster of jazz vocalists. Her 1998 self-titled debut CD has been lauded in music industry journals and by radio deejays across the country. A soon-to-be-released CD, produced by Todd Barkan and featuring bassist Ken Filiano and guitarist Ron Affif, will present Andrea’s arrangements of standard and non-standard music as well as her own compositions. In addition to singing, Andrea is a creative songwriter, lyricist, arranger, writer, poet, and actor. Her journalism and poetry have appeared in numerous publications and she is the author of two books, The Actor’s City Sourcebook and Women’s Rights, Human Rights: International Feminist Perspectives. She has acted extensively in her native California and on the Off-Broadway stage, and studied at New York’s prestigious Neighborhood Playhouse and Ensemble Studio Theatre. For more information, visit www.WordsMusic.com