Saturday, December 1, 2018

Giants of Jazz Honor the Great *CLAUDIO RODITI* This Weekend @ SOPAC :: Saturday, December 1 @ 8pm


Giants of Jazz Honoring Claudio Roditi

Saturday, December 1, 2018 @ 8pm

Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Big Band
Paquito D’Rivera
Cyrus Chestnut
Antonio Hart
Trio Da Paz
Roberta Gambarini
Maucha Adnet 
Roseanna Vitro
Romero Lubambo
Nilson Mata
Daduka Da Fonseca
Cafe
Diego Urcola
TS Monk
Dave Stryker
Freddie Hendrix
Mark Gross
Jeb Patton
Abelita Mateus
Tommy Campbell
Evan Sherman
Vince Ector
Roger Squitero
Jason Jackson
Bruce Harris
Frank Basile
Andres Boiarsky
Mike Lee
John Dukic
Steve Davis
Russell Hall
Frank Greene
Douglas Purviance

Saturday, December 1 at 8PM

Tickets: $50-$60 
Box Office: (973) 313-2787

The annual Giants of Jazz concert will celebrate its 21st year by honoring the great Brazilian trumpet master Claudio Roditi. The Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Big Band, Paquito D`Rivera, Roberta Gambarini, Antonio Hart and more will perform in his honor on the night the Jazz stars come out to shine.

During Claudio’s long and distinguished career he played and recorded with an encyclopedia of 20th century Jazz greats including Dizzy Gillespie, McCoy Tyner, Paquito D`Rivera, Herbie Mann, James Moody, Jimmy Heath, Horace Silver, Joe Henderson, the Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Big Band, and Tito Puente to name a few.

Join us as world-famous Jazz musicians take the stage to honor Claudio Roditi, musician extraordinaire, at this year’s Giants of Jazz.


Born in 1946 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Claudio Roditi began his musical studies when he was just six years old. By the time he was twelve, he had already become a serious Jazz listener. In 1966, he was named a finalist at the International Jazz Competition in Vienna, Austria. It was in Vienna where Claudio met Art Farmer, who was one of his idols, and the friendship inspired the younger trumpeter to follow a career in Jazz.

A determined Claudio then relocated to Boston in 1970 to study at Berklee College of Music. Arriving in New York in 1976, Claudio performed and/or recorded with Charlie Rouse, Herbie Mann, Paquito D’Rivera, Joe Henderson, Horace Silver, Tito Puente, and McCoy Tyner, among others. Beginning in 1989, Claudio traveled for five years as a member of Dizzy Gillespie’s United Nation Orchestra. Then, he lead his own bands and is a featured performer with several groups: Trio da Paz and Friends as well as the Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Big Band, led by John Lee, the outstanding bassist who played with Dizzy for the last ten years of his life.

Claudio has twenty-four critically acclaimed albums to his credit as well as two Grammy Award nominations for BRAZILLIANCE x 4 in the 2009 Best Latin Jazz Album category and for SYMPHONIC BOSSA NOVA in the 1995 Best Solo Performance category.

Claudio’s extensive performing, composing and recording experience, combined with his innate love of music and working with musicians, gives him a special gift to transmit his knowledge and experience in his teaching career. Whether teaching at colleges, summer Jazz residencies, or in private master classes, Claudio brings his enthusiasm for the trumpet, Jazz and Brazilian music directly into the classroom and concert hall.

A lifelong passion for the trumpet gives Claudio Roditi an open spirit for music.  This fuels an ongoing search for personal expression and musical perfection. As Neil Tesser of the Chicago Reader wrote, “. . . I can think of only a handful of modern trumpeters who combine brain and soul, technique and wisdom in a way that matches Roditi’s.”