{"id":2445563,"date":"2019-06-20T21:36:01","date_gmt":"2019-06-21T03:36:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/jazz-aspen-june-experience-bria-skonberg\/"},"modified":"2019-06-20T21:36:01","modified_gmt":"2019-06-21T03:36:01","slug":"jazz-aspen-june-experience-bria-skonberg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/jazz-aspen-june-experience-bria-skonberg\/","title":{"rendered":"Jazz Aspen June Experience: Bria Skonberg"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Bria Skonberg will perform at the Jazz Aspen Snowmass June Experience on Friday and Saturday nights.<\/strong>
Courtesy photo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Bria Skonberg takes classic songs and the hot jazz style of the 1910s, \u201920s, \u201930s and \u201940s and yanks them into the 21st century.<\/p>\n

The trumpet player and singer, who made her local debut at the JAS Caf\u00e9 in 2015 and returns for performances at the Jazz Aspen June Experience today and Saturday, is an emergent star of the jazz world. She\u2019s been honored with a 2017 Juno Award for Vocal Jazz Album of the Year and has earned a spot on DownBeat Magazine\u2019s \u201c25 for the Future\u201d list.\u201d<\/p>\n

Skonberg blends her repertoire of originals with classic jazz songs by the likes of Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday and Sidney Bechet but the old stuff is made new in Skonberg\u2019s energetic interpretations, which mash them up with contemporary sounds.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe take elements of the old jazz and infuse it with new ideas,\u201d Skonberg said during a previous stop in Aspen.<\/p>\n

A native of Chilliwack, British Columbia, she burst onto the scene when she moved to New York in 2011 \u2014 quickly becoming a trad-jazz darling on the strength of her riveting stage presence, husky vocals, creative compositions and vibrant horn playing.<\/p>\n

Jazz Aspen\u2019s Jim Horowitz first saw Skonberg in action five years ago at the New York Hot Jazz Festival, an annual daylong concert in Greenwich Village which Skonberg co-produces. Calling her a \u201ctriple threat\u201d as a band leader-trumpeter-singer, Horowitz said he was impressed by Skonberg\u2019s ability to straddle the worlds of hot jazz and contemporary music. He\u2019s since made her shows a staple of Jazz Aspen offerings.<\/p>\n

\u201cEntertaining, to me, means connecting,\u201d Horowitz said, \u201ctaking that musical gift and really using it as a way to connect with people. Not everybody has that, but it\u2019s something that I look for. \u2026 She has that ability.\u201d<\/p>\n

Skonberg began playing trumpet at age 11. Her style, she said, was influenced by classic, New Orleans jazz, along with the jukebox hits her baby boomer parents listened to and pop music. You can hear all of those notes in her fiery interpretations of hot jazz songs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI find the music itself really approachable,\u201d she said. \u201cThe melodies are lyric-based and they stick in your head. It may seem harmonically simple, but there\u2019s a real art and challenge to making it sound real and authentic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her mentors in New York include trombone player Wycliffe Gordon \u2014 who will headline the Little Nell on Sunday night \u2014 and veteran trumpeter Warren Vache.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe trumpet is a never-ending pursuit,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Amng Skonberg\u2019s indelible originals is \u201cGo Tell It\u201d \u2014 a funky, upbeat original with callbacks to the spiritual song \u201cGo Tell It On the Mountain.\u201d Skonberg said the idea for it came as she was writing and looking back at old compositions for inspiration. As the persecution of gays in Russia became a global issue around the 2014 Winter Olympics, she heard Peter, Paul and Mary\u2019s version of \u201cGo Tell It On the Mountain,\u201d a civil rights anthem of the 1960s. It inspired her to write about her generation\u2019s fight for equality.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the civil rights fight of my generation,\u201d she said. \u201cSo you can take a musical snapshot of what\u2019s going on at that time.\u201d<\/p>\n

atravers@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bria Skonberg will perform at the Jazz Aspen Snowmass June Experience on Friday and Saturday nights.Courtesy photo Bria Skonberg takes classic songs and the hot jazz style of the 1910s, \u201920s, \u201930s and \u201940s and yanks them into the 21st century. The trumpet player and singer, who made her local debut at the JAS Caf\u00e9 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2445563","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-20 02:43:26","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2445563","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2445563"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2445563\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2445563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2445563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2445563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}