Event Calendar
The Steve Sandberg Quartet
Friday, November 18, 2022, 7:30 pm
JAZZ IS BACK UPSTAIRS!
Steve Sandberg, piano
Joe Deninzon, violin
Michael O'Brien, bass
Tiago Michelin, drums
Steve Sandberg is an eclectic musician with a lifetime of experience in many worlds of music.
He is a three-time Emmy-nominated composer whose scoring, songwriting and musical direction for “Dora the Explorer”, “Go, Diego, Go!” and “Dora and Friends” helped make these shows the landmarks they are in children’s television worldwide.
He began classical piano studies at age 4 and won a BMI composers award before attending Yale University, where he majored in musical theory and composition. At Yale, his studies with noted African art theorist Robert Farris Thompson inspired him to immerse himself in the world of Afro-Caribbean music. Upon returning to NYC he played with, arranged and composed for some of the great salsa artists of the 1970s and 1980s, including Celia Cruz, Ruben Blades, and Daniel Ponce (featuring Tito Puente). A highlight of this period was an appearance in Rio and São Paolo opening for the legendary João Gilberto in a duo with vocalist Bebel Gilberto. He also toured with David Byrne (“Rei Momo”) as keyboardist and vocalist.
Steve has conducted and arranged on Broadway (Chronicle of a Death Foretold) and for many regional and Off-Broadway theatres, including the New York Shakespeare Festival.
Steve has performed improvised electronic multimedia concerts at the Knitting Factory, The Guggenheim Museum, Le Petit Versailles, and the Stone, featuring his unique voice on the breath-controlled Yamaha VL70 synthesizer. These concerts were heavily influenced by his studies of North Indian raga singing.
His latest project is the Steve Sandberg Quartet. SSQ concerts begin with performances from the solo piano repertoire (including original compositions), and continue with the quartet’s soaring improvisations on originals that draw from European, African, Latin, Balkan and Indian traditions. One listener described the experience as listening to “music from a country I’ve never been to but always wanted to visit.”
The group made its debut in June, 2016, with a sold-out show at the DiMenna Center in NYC, recorded its first CD on artistShare records, and has appeared at Birdland, NYC, the Side Door Jazz Club, the Deerhead Inn, and other prominent venues.
Tiago Michelin's musical journey began when his parents met at the Berklee College of Music, and as a toddler he was a fixture at their rehearsals and gigs. At the age of 3, he received a dilapidated drum set from his father, pianist Nando Michelin, and this became his first substitute for the pots and pans at home.
Raised in Brazil, he learned how to play traditional Brazilian percussion through capoeira lessons in school, while continuing his drum set studies at ProArte music school in Rio de Janeiro. At eighteen, he received a scholarship to Berklee College of Music, and in 2015, graduated with a Bachelor's Degree in Performance. There he also studied with late Ralph Peterson.
Since then Tiago has relocated to Brooklyn, NY, where he continues to teach and perform. He also is the regular drummer for Eliane Elias and Marc Johnson trio, performing internationally at jazz venues and festivals. Other employers and mentors he’s performed and recorded with include Chico Pinheiro, Kenny Werner, Sean Jones, Steve Wilson, Bruce Harris, Hugo Fattoruso, Guillermo Klein, Jeff Ballard, Leo Blanco, Ebinho Cardoso, Esperanza Spalding, Jerry Bergonzi, George Garzone, and many others.
Joe Deninzon has been hailed by critics as “The Jimi Hendrix of the Violin,” because of his innovative style on seven-string electric violin. Joe has worked with The Who, 50 Cent, Sheryl Crow, Bruce Springsteen, Phoebe Snow, Everclear, Ritchie Blackmore, Smokey Robinson, Aretha Franklin, Robert Bonfiglio, Les Paul, and as a soloist with the NY City Ballet and Jazz at Lincoln Center. His original music has been featured on CMT, MTV, VH1, Comedy Central, National Geographic, the Travel Channel, the History Channel, and the Will Ferrell/ Adam McKay- produced film “Virginity Hit.”
Michael O’Brien – Michael has performed and composed internationally for over a decade with such notables as Harry Connick Jr., Dave Samuels, Ruben Blades, Gene Pitney and many others.
