Sanlıkol Biographies
Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol
Turkish-American composer, performer, and scholar Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol made his Carnegie Hall debut in April 2016 premiering his commissioned piece "Harabat/The Intoxicated" with the American Composers Orchestra. Other recent works include "The Blue Typhoon," heard at Tanglewood's Ozawa Hall in a program directed by Yo-Yo Ma, and "Vecd," on A Far Cry string orchestra's GRAMMY-nominated recording Dreams and Prayers. Sanlıkol is a full-time faculty member at New England Conservatory and has been leading his unique jazz orchestra Whatsnext? since 2012. He has been praised by critics all over the world for his unique, pluralist, multicultural, and energetic musical voice. The Boston Globe noted that Sanlıkol's "music is colorful, fanciful, full of rhythmic life, and full of feeling. The multiculturalism is not touristy, but rather sophisticated, informed, internalized; Sanlikol is a citizen of the world, . . . and he is another who could play a decisive role in music's future in the world." A musical polymath, Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol has composed for, performed with, and toured with international stars and ensembles such as Dave Liebman, Bob Brookmeyer, Billy Cobham, Esperanza Spalding, Gil Goldstein, Antonio Sánchez, Anat Cohen, Tiger Okoshi, The Boston Camerata, The Boston Cello Quartet, A Far Cry, American Composers Orchestra, Okay Temiz, and Erkan Oğur.
Dave Liebman
NEA Jazz Master (2011) David Liebman's career has spanned nearly five decades, beginning in the early 1970s as the saxophone/flautist in both the Elvin Jones and Miles Davis groups, continuing as a bandleader since. He has played on over five hundred recordings with nearly two hundred under his leadership and co-leadership. In jazz education he is a renowned lecturer and author of several milestone books, including Self-Portrait of a Jazz Artist, A Chromatic Approach to Jazz Harmony and Melody, and Developing a Personal Saxophone Sound (translated into multiple languages), and he has also been responsible for teaching DVDs, journalistic contributions to periodicals, and published chamber music. Liebman is the Founder and Artistic Director of the International Association of Schools of Jazz (IASJ) since 1989; IASJ is a worldwide network of schools from nearly forty countries. Liebman's awards, besides the NEA honor, include the Jazz Educators Network (JEN) Legends of Jazz (2013); the Order of Arts and Letters (France 2009); Jazz Journalist Association's Award for Soprano Saxophone (2007); GRAMMY nomination for Best Jazz Solo (1998); and an Honorary Doctorate from the Sibelius Academy (Finland, 1997).
Ken Schaphorst
Ken Schaphorst is a composer, trumpeter, big band leader, and Chair of Jazz Studies at New England Conservatory. A founding member of the Boston-based Jazz Composers Alliance, an organization dedicated to the promotion of new music in the jazz idiom, Schaphorst has been awarded Composition Fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Massachusetts Cultural Council, and Meet the Composer. Since arriving at NEC in 2001, Schaphorst has directed the Jazz Orchestra in its performance of new music and traditional big band repertoire. Named Best College Big Band in the 2004 Downbeat Student Music Awards, the ensemble has won critical acclaim for its recordings and for its performances throughout the country.
