Please note: A PDF version of the program notes is available on the Washington Performing Arts website.

VERONICA SWIFT

with

Mathis Picard, piano
Chris Whiteman, guitar
Alexander Claffy, bass
Kyle Poole, drums

FROM THE ARTIST

This show for Washington Performing Arts is not only a comeback after a year-long hiatus of no gigs, but it is a rebirth. Originally, I was planning on performing my new album, This Bitter Earth in its entirety, however, I find that after a whole two years of playing these songs and recording them, then releasing them into the world, I see the necessity for growth and change. That is what the record is striving for—from all of us. After a journey through the dark conversations on racism, sexism, fake news, and hypocrisy, I see a light that points towards a fuller sense of self. As a result, the songs I’ve picked for this show encompass some of This Bitter Earth’s message, but we have also included new songs that mix classical with rock and roll, funk, and jazz. I now know my purpose as an artist is to break down these genre barriers and fully immerse the audience in what to me is just simply: music.

– Veronica Swift

FROM THE HOST

The first thing to say about Veronica Swift, is of course, that she’s an expert singer, with a very wide emotional and expressive range. She excels at a great variety of styles, moods, and lyrical statements. The two things that have made her so proficient are very much related—her discipline and her knowledge. She has put in the hard work not only of intense vocal preparation, but also of learning the repertoire and grand tradition of jazz and pop singers that developed alongside the creation of the classic American Popular Songbook.

As you’d expect, Veronica’s studied the jazz greats, and knows the work of Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Mildred Bailey, Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington, and others thoroughly. Beyond that, though, you can ask her about Jo Stafford, Vicki Carr, Aretha Franklin, Linda Ronstadt, Peggy Lee, and more contemporary singers such as Lady Gaga and Amy Winehouse, and she really knows their work inside and out, has thought about them, and has taken what she needs from all of them. The same is true of her familiarity with the great jazz instrumentalists and male singers.

What I can’t help commenting on, though, is the fact that she put in all the tough work to become a skilled, first-rate vocalist and acquired all that knowledge at a very young age. It makes her achievement all the more remarkable. Combine it with her terrific willingness to work out ideas and try new things, and she has all the attributes of a wonderful collaborator. It’s a pleasure and an honor to work with her.

I can’t wait for this Home Delivery Plus performance, to experience the very latest state of the art of Veronica Swift.

—Murray Horwitz

Murray Horwitz is a Tony Award–winning playwright, lyricist, and broadcaster, as well as an Artist-in-Residence at Washington Performing Arts. (See below for complete bio.)

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Still relatively early in her professional career, Veronica Swift has already developed an impressive repertoire. Raised in Charlottesville, Virginia by her parents—pianist Hod O’Brien and singer Stephanie Nakasian—she recorded her first album, Veronica’s House of Jazz, when she was only nine years old. In addition to performing with her parents, Swift sang and played trumpet with Dave Adams’s The Young Razzcals Jazz Project, which afforded her the opportunity to perform at the Telluride Jazz Festival.

After releasing her sophomore album, It’s Great to Be Alive, when she was only 11 years old, Swift continued performing at major venues such as Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City. After high school, she attended the University of Miami, where she earned her bachelor’s degree in 2016.

Before college graduation, Swift competed in the 2015 Thelonious Monk International Vocal Competition, in which she placed second. Two years later, she moved to New York City to further her career and has since performed and/or toured with a host of jazz luminaries, including trumpeters Wynton Marsalis and Chris Botti, and pianists Benny Green, Michael Feinstein, and Emmet Cohen.

Mathis Picard (piano), born in 1995, is a French-Malagasy pianist, composer, producer, and bandleader whose music warps time. Rooted in the tradition of live acoustic performance while incorporating the latest musical technology, Picard has created his own style that merges electronic bass music, jazz, classical, and stride piano.

Picard, who began playing at age three, was immediately passionate about music from the dance idiom and now focuses on sharing that passion globally, whether with his orchestra, Mathis Sound Orchestra (forthcoming debut album, World Unity), his solo project (forthcoming debut album, Live at the Museum) or his emerging quartet, The Elements.

When not performing his music, Picard has had the honor of sharing the stage with artists such as Mwenso & The Shakes, Braxton Cook, Ron Carter, Lee Ritenour, Jason Moran, CROWN, Kindness, and Wynton Marsalis.

Chris Whiteman (guitar) began playing guitar at age 12. He studied classical guitar performance at Virginia Commonwealth University and jazz performance at the University of Miami, where he received his Bachelor of Music (studio music and jazz) and Master of Music (jazz pedagogy). Whiteman was the graduate teaching assistant for the Jazz Guitar Department, and played in the Grammy-nominated UM Concert Jazz Band. Eventually joining the UM faculty as a full-time lecturer, he taught small ensembles, improvisation classes, and private lessons, and held the title of Acting Director of Jazz Guitar Studies.

Whiteman has performed throughout the United States and Europe, worked with Grammy-winning artists and producers, composed music for film, and taught thousands of guitar lessons during his more than 20 years as a musician. He is currently a signature artist arranger for Musicnotes.com, the world leader in digital sheet music, as well as a freelance arranger for SheetMusicPlus.com. His latest recording project is a collaboration with jazz guitar legend Royce Campbell, entitled The Campbell/Whiteman Project.

Alexander Claffy (bass) was raised in a musical household—his father is a pianist, his mother, a vocalist—and had many of his earliest lessons on bandstands in the heart of Philadelphia. As a teenager, Claffy was fortunate enough to find a mentor in many Philadelphians, and has continued his study of the double bass with some of the world’s finest musicians, including Ron Carter, Dwayne Burno, and Orin O’Brien. Since moving to New York City in 2011, he has had the honor of working with many of his living heroes, including Jimmy Cobb, Louis Hayes, Harold Mabern, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Christian Scott, Joey Alexander, Wallace Roney, and many more. In the past three years, he has recorded for the Verve, HighNote, Positone, RopeADope, and LaReserve record labels.

Hailed by Jazz Speaks as a “young prodigious drummer,” Los Angeles–native Kyle Poole (drums) has been residing in New York City since 2011 and continues to impress wherever his drums take him. Along with his band of fellow New York jazz upstarts, aptly titled “Poole & the Gang,” Poole has performed in New York’s most esteemed jazz clubs—notably Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola and SMOKE Jazz—culminating in a weekly residency at Small’s Jazz Club, lasting nearly three years. One of Poole’s chief missions is to expand jazz’s audience by incorporating all dance styles of music, reaching back to ragtime & bebop while forging ahead to funk, hip hop, and beyond. With the constant fluctuation of genre, rhythm, and harmony, “Poole & the Gang” connects these musical dots in a uniquely improvised fashion, while audiences worldwide are delighted to simply “go with the flow.”

ABOUT THE HOST

Murray Horwitz is a Tony Award–winning playwright, lyricist, and broadcaster, who has been called “my first mentor” by Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda. His accomplishments include originating the NPR comedy quiz Wait, Wait…Don’t Tell Me, co-authoring the hit Broadway musical Ain’t Misbehavin’, writing song lyrics for John Harbison’s The Great Gatsby at The Metropolitan Opera, touring in his one-man show, An Evening Of Sholom Aleichem, and co-creating the Mark Twain Prize in American Humor at the Kennedy Center. In 2016, he became host and producer of The Big Broadcast on WAMU 88.5 FM in Washington, and in 2017, he was named Artist in Residence at Washington Performing Arts. His other awards include three Peabody Awards and the Order of Arts and Letters from the government of France. A graduate of Kenyon College, he began his career as a Ringling Bros. Barnum & Bailey Circus clown.

EVENT SPONSORS

This performance is made possible through the generous support of Ellen and Michael Gold.

Home Delivery Plus performances recorded at Sixth & I are made possible in part through the generous support of the Galena-Yorktown Foundation.

Linger Longers on Home Delivery Plus are made possible through the generous support of an anonymous donor.

The Arts, Undistanced is made possible through the generous support of an anonymous donor and Northern Trust.

SERIES SPONSORS

Thank you to the following lead supporters of Washington Performing Arts’s mission-driven work in 2020/21, including presentation of Home Delivery Plus: Jacqueline Badger Mars and Mars, Incorporated; D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities; Betsy and Robert Feinberg; Dr. Gary Mather and Ms. Christina Co Mather; the National Capital Arts and Cultural Affairs Program and the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts; Tom Gallagher; The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation; and the Dallas Morse Coors Foundation for the Performing Arts.