A Bu is an up-and-coming pianist whose youth belies his formidable talent. Born in Beijing, China, he began classical studies at age 4 and became enthralled by jazz after listening to a recording of Dominican jazz pianist Michel Camilo. A Bu has performed at the Beijing International Blues Festival, Montreux Jazz Festival, Nine Gates International Jazz Festival (Beijing), China Yangtze River Piano Festival, JZ Festival Shanghai, and Duc de Lombards jazz club in Paris. His 2014 debut release, 88 Tones of Black and White, received critical acclaim, with All About Jazz critic Karl Ackermann remarking that “Bu’s potential is almost off the charts.” A Bu currently studies at The Juilliard School in New York.

Pianist, composer and music director John Beasley is a musical chameleon with an amazing track record. He has performed and recorded with a wide range of legendary artists including Miles Davis, Freddie Hubbard, Dianne Reeves, Steely Dan, Queen Latifah, and Chaka Khan. Beasley has released 20 albums, garnering two GRAMMY awards and 13 nominations. As a first-call session musician and composer, Beasley can be heard in films and tv shows including Skyfall, Spectre, Finding Nemo, Finding Dory, and Star Trek: The Next Generation. Since International Jazz Day’s inauguration, Beasley has served as music director for the global gala concerts in cities around the world and at the White House concert hosted by President Obama, which earned him an Emmy nomination for Best Musical Direction for “Jazz at the White House.”

Dee Dee Bridgewater’s exuberance, creativity, undeniable confidence and joyous spirit have earned her a place as one of the premier vocalists in jazz. Early in her career, Bridgewater spent two years as lead vocalist for the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra, followed by two years as Glinda the Good Witch in the Broadway production of The Wiz, for which she received a Tony Award. Her subsequent portrayal of Billie Holiday in Lady Day won her a Laurence Olivier Award nomination for Best Actress. Bridgewater received Horace Silver’s blessing to record an album of his music with vocals. The resulting Peace and Love brought her worldwide attention. A Doris Duke Artist, Bridgewater won her third GRAMMY for Eleanora Fagan (1917-1959): To Billie With Love From Dee Dee.

Terri Lyne Carrington is a three-time GRAMMY Award-winning drummer, producer and recording artist. Born in Medford, Massachusetts, Carrington received her first set of drums at age 3. At 10, she had her first major performance with trumpet legend Clark Terry and as a teenager, Carrington performed and recorded with Kenny Barron, Buster Williams, Stan Getz and James Moody. She later moved to Los Angeles to become the drummer for “The Arsenio Hall Show.” Throughout the ’90s, she performed with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock, and played alongside Joni Mitchell and Stevie Wonder on Hancock’s GRAMMY Award-winning Gershwin’s World. Carrington teaches at the Berklee College of Music and serves as Artistic Director of the Berklee Beantown Jazz Festival. Her 2013 Concord release Money Jungle: Provocative in Blue was a much-anticipated homage to Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus and Max Roach that coincided with the 50th anniversary of their iconic 1963 Money Jungle album. Carrington made history with this album when she became the first woman to win a GRAMMY Award for Best Jazz Instrumental Album. Her latest effort is a follow-up to her critically acclaimed 2011 album The Mosaic Project, titled The Mosaic Project: Love and Soul. Like its predecessor, the album presents Carrington leading a rotating cast of superb female instrumentalists and vocalists.

Pianist and composer Emmet Cohen is one of his generation’s pivotal figures in jazz. Leader of the Emmet Cohen Trio and creator of the Masters Legacy Series, he is an internationally acclaimed jazz artist, a dedicated educator, the winner of the 2019 American Pianists Awards, and a finalist in the 2011 Thelonious Monk International Piano Competition. Cohen headlines regularly at Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Village Vanguard, and Birdland, and has appeared at the Newport, Monterey, and North Sea jazz festivals. His artistry has taken him to venues and festivals in over 30 countries. Cohen’s entrepreneurial energies led to his developing “Live From Emmet’s Place,” a live-streamed “Harlem rent party” that unites a worldwide audience via tens of millions of internet views. Cohen has released over ten albums as leader and has performed or recorded with Ron Carter, Benny Golson, Jimmy Cobb, George Coleman, Jimmy Heath, Tootie Heath, Houston Person, Christian McBride, and Kurt Elling.

Kurt Elling combines his extraordinary vocal talents with his bandleading, composing and arranging to produce a sound that has been thrilling audiences for more than two decades. Elling developed his idiosyncratic scat style in the clubs of Chicago, sharing the stage with the renowned Von Freeman and Ed Peterson. He signed with Blue Note in 1995 and went on to release six Blue Note albums, all of which have been GRAMMY nominated and critically acclaimed. He won the 2010 GRAMMY Award for Best Vocal Jazz Album for his Concord release Dedicated to You. Elling was named top male vocalist in the DownBeat Critics Poll for 13 consecutive years. His most recent effort is Secrets are the Best Stories, a duet album featuring Danilo Pérez.

Oran Etkin is a dynamic clarinetist and saxophonist who creates unique music that blends cultures from all over the world. Etkin was born in Israel and moved to Boston when he was five years old. At fourteen, he began studying with Yusef Lateef and George Garzone. He attended Brandies University where he studied economics and classical clarinet before receiving a masters degree in jazz from Manhattan School of Music. After graduation, Etkin attended a dance class with Malian teacher Joh Camara. This experience inspired him to explore the music of Mali, leading to several educational trips to the country. He has since released three albums blending the music of Mali with traditional jazz. The recordings feature Malian musicians along with American jazz artists. Outside of performing, Etkin is a teacher who has developed his own method called Timbalooloo, which is designed to teach music to children as young as three years old.

World-renowned pianist and composer Herbie Hancock is one of the most innovative and influential musicians of our time. A modern music icon, he has shaped the direction of jazz, fusion, funk and hip-hop for more than six decades. From his recordings with the legendary Miles Davis Quintet to his solo jazz albums and pioneering music incorporating multiple genres, Hancock has always been on the cutting edge. He has earned 14 GRAMMY Awards including Album of the Year for River: The Joni Letters, and an Academy Award for his score for the film Round Midnight. A Kennedy Center honoree, Hancock serves as Creative Director for the Los Angeles Philharmonic and UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for Intercultural Dialogue. He is the Chairman of the Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz and a Distinguished Professor at the Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz Performance at UCLA.

Jeremy Irons is one of the most celebrated actors of our time and one of the few to have earned an Academy Award, a Tony Award, three Emmy Awards and two Golden Globe Awards. Throughout his career, Irons has appeared in hundreds of film, television and theatre productions. As a film actor, he starred in Reversal of Fortune, for which he received an Academy Award, along with M. Butterfly, Merchant of Venice and numerous other now classic films. Among his dozens of television appearances, Irons has been featured in Brideshead Revisited, Elizabeth I, The Mission, The Borgias and Watchmen. His theatre performances include Never So Good, The Gods Weep and The Real Thing, for which he received a Tony Award. In addition to his acting work, Irons previously served as a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization.

José James is a jazz vocalist for the hip-hop generation. Raised in Duluth and Minneapolis, Minnesota, he first attracted notice as a semifinalist in the 2004 Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz International Vocals Competition. James later moved to New York to attend the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music. His debut album, the critically-acclaimed, Gilles Peterson-produced Dreamer, displayed what The Guardian called “a highly personal mix of Bobby McFerrin’s tonal delicacy and the R&B and soul feel of D’Angelo,” and propelled him to appearances on major stages worldwide. James has since released nine albums, including 2020’s No Beginning No End 2, which features the vocalist sharing tracks with the likes of Ledisi, Aloe Blacc, Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, Laura Mvula and Kris Bowers. His most recent release is José James: New York 2020 (Live), recorded at the height of New York’s COVID-19 lockdown.

Rhani Krija is a percussionist whose vast knowledge of music from around the world has made him a highly sought-after collaborator for some of the biggest names in music. Born in Essaouira, Morocco, the heart of the Gnawa culture, Krija grew up listening to traditional musical styles from North Africa. He is known for his ability to play authentic Andalusian, Arabic, African and Latin rhythms. Krija has toured and performed with internationally celebrated artists including Sting, Herbie Hancock, Placido Domingo, Peter Gabriel, Annie Lennox and Prince. Additionally, he has appeared with the WDR Orchestra and the Royal Symphony Orchestra of London. Krija is also an educator and has released online workshops for aspiring percussionists.

A revolutionary force in music, John McLaughlin has been forging his own path on guitar since the 1960s and is still pointing the way forward. Growing up in Yorkshire, England, McLaughlin studied violin and piano before gravitating to the guitar. He played in a variety of bands in London and later joined Tony Williams’ Lifetime band and moved to New York. McLaughlin soon found himself in the studio with Miles Davis recording what would become the classic album In a Silent Way. In 1971, he formed the Mahavishnu Orchestra, which brought together rock, jazz, and Eastern music and had a massive impact on musicians and music lovers around the world. The always creatively restless McLaughlin moved on to form Shakti, in which he played acoustic guitar and further immersed himself in Indian classical music. Throughout the following decades, he worked in a variety of groups and played on dozens of albums with artists including Stanley Clarke, Carlos Santana, Dexter Gordon and Wayne Shorter. McLaughlin’s most recent album is 2015’s Black Light, which features his jazz fusion quartet, the 4th Dimension.

Linda May Han Oh is a critically acclaimed bassist, composer and bandleader who ranks among the most influential players of her generation. Born in Malaysia and raised in Perth, Western Australia, Oh graduated from the Manhattan School of Music and then began a trajectory that would see her perform and record with acclaimed artists including Pat Metheny, Kenny Barron, Joe Lovano, Terri Lyne Carrington and Geri Allen, among others. Oh has received numerous awards for her playing and composing, including an ASCAP Young Jazz Composer Award and recognition as a “Rising Star” in the 2012 DownBeat Critics Poll. She was voted the 2018, 2019 and 2020 Bassist of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association, as well as 2019 Up-and-coming Artist of the Year. Oh is the recent recipient of a Jerome Foundation Fellowship, a Chamber Music America New Jazz Works Grant, and the 2020 Margaret Whitton Award. Her latest release is Walk Against Wind on Biophilia Records. Oh is also an accomplished educator who serves as Ensemble Director for the Berklee Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice.

Five-time GRAMMY Award winner Dianne Reeves is one of the premier vocalists on the worldwide music scene. A native of Denver, she began her career touring with Sergio Mendes and Harry Belafonte, then signed to Blue Note in 1987. Her self-titled debut, featuring Herbie Hancock, Freddie Hubbard and Tony Williams, was nominated for a GRAMMY. Featured in George Clooney’s Good Night, and Good Luck, Reeves won the Best Jazz Vocal GRAMMY for the film’s soundtrack. In recent years, she has toured the world and collaborated with Lizz Wright and Angelique Kidjo for “Sing the Truth,” a musical celebration of Nina Simone. Reeves has performed at the White House on multiple occasions, including President Obama’s State Dinner for the President of China. In 2018, she was named a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master – the highest honor the United States bestows on jazz artists.

GRAMMY Award-winner David Sánchez is recognized around the world as one of the finest saxophonists of his generation. He combines his deep knowledge of jazz and Latin music, and the traditions that mold them, with extraordinary results. Sánchez was born in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico, and took up the conga at age 8. He started playing saxophone at age 12 and came to the United States to study music at Rutgers University. Sánchez joined Dizzy Gillespie’s United Nation Orchestra in 1990 and Gillespie became his mentor. The group toured the world, performing in 27 countries and 100 U.S. cities. Sánchez signed with Columbia Records and released seven albums, beginning with 1996’s Street Scenes, which was influenced by Puerto Rican folkloric music. In 2004, Sánchez released Coral, which earned him his first Latin GRAMMY Award for Best Instrumental Album. In 2011, Sánchez joined forces with Stefon Harris and Christian Scott for the Ninety Miles Project, which resulted in a successful album and documentary film produced in Havana with some of Cuba’s finest musicians. Over the years, Sánchez has performed and recorded with Kenny Barron, Roy Haynes, Pat Metheny, Roy Hargrove, Danilo Pérez and Gonzalo Rubalcaba. For more than a decade, he has shared his passion for music with students at Puerto Rico’s Conservatorio de Música. Sánchez continues to tour the world as a bandleader, bringing his mix of mainstream jazz with Latin influences to audiences around the globe.

Named one of the “Five Drummers Whose Time Is Now” by The New York Times, Kendrick Scott is a consummate musician whose jaw-dropping power behind the drums is matched only by his remarkable finesse. Scott was born in Houston, Texas, and grew up in a family of musicians. He began playing drums at age 8 and attended Houston’s renowned High School for the Performing and Visual Arts. Scott won several DownBeat student music awards, as well as the prestigious Clifford Brown/Stan Getz Award from the International Association of Jazz Education. He was later awarded a scholarship to attend the Berklee College of Music, where he majored in music education. Scott has toured with Herbie Hancock, Charles Lloyd, The Crusaders, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Kurt Elling and Terence Blanchard, also appearing on several of the trumpeter’s Blue Note albums. Scott has released three albums as a bandleader, including two with his group, Oracle, a collective of young musicians including John Ellis, Taylor Eigsti, Mark Moreno and Joe Sanders. In 2014, Scott performed as a member of the Blue Note Records 75th Anniversary all-star band that included Ambrose Akinmusire, Robert Glasper, Derrick Hodge, Lionel Loueke and Marcus Strickland. Scott’s Blue Note debut is 2015’s We Are the Drum, which includes six of his compelling compositions.