Chris Cody, piano
Michael Avgenicos, sax
David Groves, bass
James Waples, drums.

Pianist and composer Chris Cody has performed and recorded internationally for the last 25 years while based in Paris. He has headlined at many international festivals including Paris Quartiers d’Eté, London, Rome, Brussels Jazz Marathon, Marciac, Nantes, and Algiers and at a vast array of concert venues throughout the USA, Europe and Africa. He has worked with many outstanding international musicians including Rick Margitza, Roy Hargrove, Glenn Ferris, Carla Bruni, Annie Whitehead, Tina Arena, Michel Jonaz, Rhoda Scott and Herb Geller.

With nine CDs of his music released on international labels he has received glowing reviews and featured on radio and television around the world, and has collaborated on over thirty other albums.

His compositions have been commissioned for the inauguration of the Australian Music Centre Paris, as well as for the Sydney Theatre Company, American Academy of Dance, Pillow Book Dance Company Pittsburg, and other French and American theatre companies, and he has composed the music for eight films, and several TV and Radio documentaries.

He was a member of the judging panel for the 2014 and 2015 Freedman Fellowship Jazz Prize, Australia.

 "Magical!" Piano Magazine, France

"Exhilarating ... a feast of melody… an inspiration never at fault" JazzHot, France

"Full of music and future!" Le Monde, France

"A marvellous climate, between subtle arrangements and vast spaces of improvisation..." Jazz Magazine, France

"Very luminous jazz!" Télérama, France

"This is jazz that takes off for the heights" Figaroscope, France

"A European sensibility with a nod to Debussy" Rolling Stone

"Splendidly rich and varied" Jazzwise, U.K

"A performance full of colour, humour and rhythmic movement." Sydney Morning Herald, Australia

"A fine mix of superior technical talent and youthful inventiveness" Variety USA

Launched one year ago, Chris Cody's album Not My Lover continues to do well - here are some recent  media highlights:

“A piano style that enthuses, is luminous and breathes, with slicing attacks, a left hand in support with unique chords, a right hand that sings…For Satie, revisited by the blues and the Balkans, is a minor masterpiece…very inspired…a fine and solid quartet and especially a remarkable pianist, like a fish in water in piano trio.” Jazz Hot, France

“The City of Light has the strongest of Jazz associations and Cody captures that intimate relationship perfectly .You can feel the ebb and flow of the city’s life running through his fingertips as he plays. The beauty of the architecture, the elegant Seine, the mad driving through the twisted maze of streets. Cody is a man of great charm and warmth and the compositions echo his urbane humanity.” JazzLocal - John Fenton, NZ

“You feel a particular cosmopolitanism seeping through the music: jazz colliding with European sensibilities and France colliding with African ones. Cody is an equally sophisticated composer and pianist who likes to create mood-based pieces and solos in which a touch of ambiguity or mystery compounds the interest. … Cody generates a striking luminosity from the piano's upper register. “ Sydney Morning Herald

“Cody works with flair and sensitivity... This is an album of talented performers playing varied compositions, adding an unusual jazz piano style that’s incorporates interesting classical ideas and flourishes”. The Australian

“Solid pleasure…a very solid and satisfying disc…a fast, happily frantic dance…top flight musicians…the piano suggests both abandon and contemplation…his playing is often funky with a modern boogie or shuffle feeling to it… a very beautiful re-working of Satie’s Gnossienne No. 3” Loudmouth, John Clare

“Polished composition and pianism … Modern contemporary improvised music doesn’t get much better or more enjoyable than this and Cody proves he is the master of form.” Fine Music Magazine

Kelly is a pianist from Tasmania : a great improvisor with a great groove.  His last concert for us was beautiful, we booked him immediately for his next Sydney trip.

this one will feature Dan Barnett on trombone, as well as Amelia Johnson on vocals.

http://abcjazz.net.au/artist/kelly-ottaway

“The stars seem to have aligned themselves… His playing achieves an aim of “stillness” in the air that is certainly evident.”
4/5 stars    – Peter Wockner, Jazz and Beyond 

The Tim Clarkson Trio is an intimate band with bite to their playing. They bring together elements of music often at odds with each other: their compositions can be rhythmically and melodically intricate, but in spite of this a sense of groove, melodicism and quirky playfulness permeates the band. With a sense of space and occasion, it is music that gets both the head and the heart, not one at expense of the other.

Tim has a unique approach to saxophone-bass-drum trio which shares roles, often turning elements of the music on their head, with bass and drums often at the forefront. Audiences are always delighted and surprised at their musical twists and turns, and the stories they weave. They have been playing together for a decade, toured nationally and their 2013 album “Land of Free Men” has been heavily featured on ABC Radio. 

​timclarksonmusic.com 

This is Francesca's 8th Colbourne Ave gig, and since the last one, Francesca has recorded her first album, Night Trip (to be launched at Foundry 616 in April)... and she's got engaged to Sydney guitarist Nic Vardanega.

We have a couple of bottles of champagne in the fridge 

Originally from Indonesia, but currently based in Sydney, pianist Francesca Prihasti is a graduate from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, where she studied under Judy Bailey, Kevin Hunt, Matt McMahon, and Mike Nock. Her quartet will feature Australia's Finest Dave Goodman on Drums and two wonderful young musicians Nic Vardanega (guitar) and David Groves (double bass)  Francesca's original music seeks to align with her artistic vision which is to evoke the conjuring of various rhythms, sophisticated harmony and lyrical melody whilst drawing inspiration from an extensive range of musical traditions which in addition to jazz include latin, classical, pop, folk, and ethnic music influences.

Nic is an emerging local guitarist, who has recently completed his studies at the con.  He's played at Colbourne Ave with Francesca Prihasti many times, and for the first time this thursday he'll be bringing his own band to the venue.

Originally from Indonesia, but currently based in Sydney, pianist Francesca Prihasti is a recent graduate from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, studied under Mike Nock and has already played with some of Australia's Best jazz musicians: Dale Barlow, Carl Dewhurst, and Richard Maegraith.

Francesca's four piece band, featuring the wonderful Dave Goodman (drums) and also two of these rising jazz musicians: Nic Vardanega (guitar) and David Groves (double bass), will be presenting her original compositions and new arrangements of standards, imbued by Francesca's poise and crystalline focus.

Originally from Indonesia (in 2005, she led her quartet in the Jakarta International Java Jazz Festival) and currently based in Sydney, Pianist Francesca Prihasti is studying under Mike Nock at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, and comes to Colbourne Ave having recently played with Dale Barlow in his Sidewoman project. Her six piece band featuring drumming dynamo Nic Cecire, Bassist David Groves and guitarist Nic Vardanega, will be playing original compositions and arrangements of standards, imbued with Prihasti's poise and crystaline focus.