Edward Simon Trio featuring Anat Cohen

“Simon is less talked about than many other important jazz pianists from the Caribbean and South America, but he may be the most complete creative artist among them.” —JazzTimes

“Cohen has emerged as one of the brightest, most original young instrumentalists in jazz. . . with a distinctive accent of her own.”  —The Washington Post

A composer of extraordinary depth and breadth, Venezuelan-born Edward Simon has been a Guggenheim Fellow along with being awarded multiple composition grants as part of the Chamber Music America’s New Jazz Works initiative. He has recorded 16 albums as a leader or co-leader; his latest is Solo Live, released via Ridgeway Records in October 2021. This follows Simon’s 2020 album 25 Years and his 2016 album Latin American Songbook, with the four-and-a-half-star DownBeat review praising its “grand and sophisticated” sound. Latin American Songbook also won Simon an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Jazz Album. The New York Times has praised Simon’s “light, warm touch” as a pianist, while Jazz Journal International singled out “his deep emotional statements” as a composer and improviser. Simon is a 2021 recipient of Chamber Music America’s New Jazz Works and South Arts Jazz Road Creative Residencies awards.

A member of the SFJAZZ Collective and a faculty member at the San Francisco Conservatory, California Jazz Conservatory, and the Stanford Jazz Workshop, Edward has become one of the bright lights of the Bay Area jazz scene.

Like Edward, clarinetist Anat Cohen has the music of Latin America and the Caribbean in her soul. Anat puts on some of the most exciting shows every year at the Stanford Jazz Festival, and this show is going to be one for the books.