Jazz Vespers: The Rocco John Group

NYC's unique jazz prayer service, Sundays at 5 since 1965. All are welcome. Free to attend!

This week, we welcome the Rocco John Group. The Rocco John group has been playing together for many years. Leaning towards the improvisational, their work can include elements of Jazz Standards and originals, or run the gamut from Classical to completely free compositions.

About Rocco John

Rocco John Iacovone was born and raised in NYC's Greenwich Village, Rocco is a composer/performer who presents exciting, original music with a twist of structure and a melodic base. He is a strong improviser and free player whose written works feature improvisation as a compositional device. Saxophonist/pianist Rocco John studied with Jazz legends, Lee Konitz and Sam Rivers, as well as the direct disciples of Nadia Boulanger. As a result, his original compositions blend that "in" and "out" sensibility. His extensive discography has garnered high praise. Rocco records with various groups for Unseen Rain Records, Woodshed records and Silver Horn Records. He holds a Bachelors and Masters degree in composition from Hunter College. Rocco has presented four Chamber Music America Residencies, the latest just this past summer. In 2024 he returned to Messina Italy to perform a premiere of his own songbook. He plays regularly at Tomi Jazz.

About Jack DeSalvo

Jack DeSalvo, born in New York City, developed his extraordinary guitar style from a deep immersion into modern jazz, classical guitar and his own prolific compositional output. He has been compared to artists as diverse as Ralph Towner and John McLaughlin and has studied guitar with Bill Connors and Leonid Bolotine, composition with Ariada Mikéshina (herself a student of Richard Strauss) and at Berklee College of Music as well as with composer and theorist George Russell. DeSalvo performs regularly with his own trio, quartet and the group Quintrepid. Jack also plays and records with Rocco as part of ZONE. A prolific composer and record producer, Jack founded the visionary label, Unseen Rain Records with his brother, Jim DeSalvo.

About Phil Sirois

Phil Sirois is a Massachusetts born, Queens based double bassist. In the past twenty years he has lent his lyrical style to a wide variety of projects, encompassing the American songbook to straight ahead jazz to free improvisational/experimental music. He plays regularly in New York, and his work is broadly represented on the Unseen Rain record label. When not playing the bass, Phil enjoys animal husbandry, making his own soap, and spending time with his imaginary friends.

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