JAZZ@FIRST | WHITE CHRISTMAS

Join the Phil DeGreg Trio, trumpeter Hank Mautner and vocalist Kelly MacKenzie-Thurley as they pay tribute to the many Jewish composers who wrote some of our most iconic holiday and Christmas songs. Enjoy new arrangements of familiar holiday classics, including the iconic Irving Berlin hit “White Christmas,” which is the most-recorded Christmas song and the best-selling single of all-time.

 

A complimentary wine and cheese intermission is included with your ticket.

 

Jazz@First Series Sponsor: Al Harris

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About the Artist: Hank Mautner, trumpet (profile from bluewispbigband.com)

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Hank Mautner has been a fixture of the Greater Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky music scene since arriving here more than 35 years ago. As a trumpet player, he is a decades-long member of the Blue Wisp Big Band, a member of the Original Farm League Big Band, and has frequently played both the lead and solo jazz trumpet chairs with virtually every major jazz, commercial and Latin group in the region, including the Cincinnati Contemporary Jazz Orchestra, the Columbus Jazz Orchestra, Pat Kelly’s Psychoacoustic Orchestra, Carmen DeLeone’s Studio Big Band, Tropicoso, Jaime Morales’ Latin Beat, Bill Gemmer’s Royal Palm Orchestra and many others. He is founder and musical director of the Cincinnati Swing Heritage Orchestra, and he has arranged and composed music for a wide array of musical groups and for singers including Kelly Mackenzie-Thurley, Mike Reid, Lynne Scott and Nancy James.

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Prior to moving to Cincinnati, Hank worked as a freelance musician in New York City and was a tenured full-time faculty member at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire before relocating into the business world. Hank and his wife Jeannette live in Newport, Kentucky under the very benevolent dictatorship of Stoney, their rescue schnauzer, who we know will be reading this.
 

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About the Artist: Kelly Mackenzie-Thurley, vocals (profile from caffevivace.com)

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Kelly MacKenzie-Thurley is a graduate of both Northern Kentucky University and the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. She has sung in venues and festivals throughout the United States, Australia, Italy, Czech Republic, Austria, the United Kingdom and Germany, including performances at Cincinnati’s Music Hall, Harlech Castle and the Sydney Opera House.

 

Kelly is a sought-after music educator. She is on the voice faculty at Northern Kentucky University’s School of the Arts and was recently invited to join the faculty at Cincinnati School for Creative & Performing Arts. In 2018 she took over as Director of the NKU Vocal Jazz Ensemble and has continued her studies with Darmon Meader of New York Voices. In October 2021, Kelly served as a Jazz Ambassador for the Cincinnati-Nancy Sister Jazz Initiative in Nancy, France. Kelly continues to perform regularly throughout southwest Ohio including Caffé Vivace, Muse Café and the Härth Room, and has upcoming performances with the Cincinnati Contemporary Jazz Orchestra.

 

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About the Artist: Phil DeGreg, piano

 

Phil DeGreg began playing the piano in his childhood and now performs as a jazz pianist internationally. His earliest jazz influences were Bud Powell and Bill Evans, but he is accomplished and comfortable in a wide range of jazz styles, ranging from mainstream to bebop to Brazilian jazz. A graduate of Yale and the University of North Texas, he toured with the Woody Herman Orchestra in the 1980s and has 10 CDs to his credit as a leader. For 13 years he accompanied many national and international jazz artists in the house trio in Cincinnati’s famous Blue Wisp Jazz Club. He has been on staff with the renowned Jamey Aebersold Summer Jazz Workshops since 1983, and has performed and taught in Europe and South America.

 

Phil DeGreg is the retired Professor of Jazz Studies at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and is the recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts study grants. In 2008 he was awarded a 4-month Fulbright Fellowship as a lecturer in Brazil.

 

His text “Jazz Keyboard Harmony” is a practical text for teaching jazz harmony for all musicians, and is used all over the world in universities and for private study.

 

Learn more about Phil DeGreg on his website http://phildegreg.com.