Search - Ken Berman :: Looking Forward

Ken Berman's new album, Looking Forward, features a kinetic trio with bass virtuoso Kai Eckhardt and the legendary Akira Tana on drums performing breathtaking and inspired jazz in the mold of Keith Jarrett, Brad Mehldau, Pat Metheny, and Bill Evans, but at the same time sounding unassumingly unique and profoundly original. Pianist and composer Ken Berman has performed and recorded with Bob Moses, Yoron Israel, Kai Eckhardt, Akira Tana, John Lockwood, Bob Gullotti, Rémi Vignolo, Jaleel Shaw, Sarah Manning, Take Toriyama and others: he has appeared on the famed stages of Carnegie Hall in New York, Yoshi's in San Francisco, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Detroit's Fox Theater, and The Sunside in Paris. Ken has been the recipient of several artist grants and awards for his ongoing work in jazz education. His music was the subject of special features on KCSM in San Francisco, KPFA in Berkeley, and on KZSU at Stanford University, where his playing drew comparisons with Bill Evans, Ramsey Lewis and Keith Jarrett. His work has received special notice on jazz radio stations KCSM in San Francisco, WGBH in Boston, WFMT in Chicago, and WEMU in Michigan, and has been playlisted on jazz radio stations in the United States, Europe, and Japan. Reviewing Ken Berman's 2006 CD "In Mind" for The L.A. Jazz Scene, jazz critic Scott Yanow writes: "When listening to Ken Berman's trio CD In Mind, it is easy to think of Keith Jarrett and Bill Evans, for Berman's chord voicings and his close interplay with his sidemen recall the work of his two predecessors. The difference is that Berman wrote all ten selections, he never copies Evans or Jarrett, and at times he sounds more advanced than either of them. The music overall is both swinging and thoughtful, spontaneous and purposeful." The SF Weekly described Berman's music as "contemplative jazz, gentle but without a trace of fluff or artifice," and the great French newspaper Le Monde praised him as a "fluid and erudite" jazz performer and composer whose "complex improvisations are imbued with delicate sensuality and brilliance." In Mind was rated one of the top 15 jazz releases of 2006 on the Jazz with Bob Parlocha website. Ken is currently on the music faculty at the University of California Berkeley and lectures at Stanford University.