Our current spotlight artist, The Craig Russo Latin Jazz Project, brings a fresh perspective onto straight-ahead Latin Jazz performance. They’ve got a great balance of unique arrangements and original material, but the truly outstanding feature of the group is their complementary performance styles. Each member brings years of practical musical experience into the group, reflecting their interests in both straight-ahead jazz and Latin music. They each excel as soloists, work well as supporting players, and apply their collective musicianship towards the improvement of the song. Small group jazz ensembles can sound like several musicians thrown together for the gig, but this group sounds like a solid unit that has played together often.

It’s a strong group aesthetic - something you don’t hear everyday in our modern jazz world. You can check out The Craig Russo Latin Jazz Project on MySpace and their own website. In The Middle is actually the group’s second album, so there’s more great Latin Jazz on their first album, Soul Eyes!

Don’t Forget! You can download a free track from In The Middle at the LJC Listening Center!

I’ve combined material from the band’s website, teaching bios, and individual web pages to bring you some background information on the different band members. Check it out and then head over to the LJC Listening Center - you’ve got to hear these guys!

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The best of both worlds when Latin meets jazz! The Craig Russo Latin Jazz Project is a fresh mix of outstanding jazz soloists, rich, Afro-Cuban inspired rhythms, and unique arrangements of jazz standards.

Featuring:
Craig Russo (Drums,Congas)
Craig Russo has performed as a Latin percussionist and drumset artist for twenty years in the Midwest and Northeast. In addition to his strong jazz background, Craig has a special interest in Afro-Cuban music styles. He has traveled several times to Cuba in recent years, to study at the National School of Arts with such renowned Cuban percussionists as Enrique Pla’, Jose Eladio, Roberto Vizcaino, Adel Gonzalez, Jose Lario and Sergio Luis Cardoza.

Craig has been featured on both drumset and congas with several regional Salsa and Latin jazz groups, over the last several years. These include Adelante (Champaign, IL); Miavana (Champaign, IL); The Tim Green Latin Jazz Ensemble (Champaign, IL); Urbano (Syracuse, NY); The Walter Bell Latin Jazz Unit (Richmond, VA); and Clavesol (St. Louis, MO). In 2002, Craig formed The Craig Russo Latin Jazz Project. This unique group, based in Central Illinois, features some of the finest area musicians between St. Louis and Chicago. The group’s focus is to blend jazz repertoire with Afro-Caribbean rhythms. The group most commonly performs as a quintet or sextet, using one or two horn players, two percussionists, piano, and bass.

Chip McNeill (Tenor Saxophone)
Chip McNeill is a jazz tenor saxophonist, composer, arranger, and educator. In addition to his responsibilities as associate professor and chair of jazz, Professor McNeill is the musical director and jazz tenor saxophonist for Grammy award-winning recording artist Arturo Sandoval. Professor McNeill has recorded with Sandoval on his CDs Americana and Hot House. Hot House won a Grammy Award for Best Latin Jazz Performance. Professor McNeill has also worked closely with legendary jazz trumpeter Maynard Ferguson. He produced, wrote, and performed on five recent CDs with Ferguson and has toured with Ferguson, Sandoval, and many other notable jazz performers. Professor McNeill has performed at countless jazz festivals and clubs around the world, including the Montreux Jazz Festival (Switzerland), Monterey Jazz Festival (U.S.A.), and Noto Jazz Festival (Japan), as well as performing at Carnegie Hall, Town Hall (Sydney, Australia), London Palladium, and on numerous jazz radio and television productions in Europe, Japan, the U.K., India, and Indonesia. In addition to recording with Sandoval and Ferguson, Professor McNeill has recorded with such musicians as Nat Adderley, David Liebman, Duffy Jackson, Ira Sullivan, The Woody Herman Orchestra, Ted Shumate, and Larry Willis, and has performed with such entertainers as Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis, Jr., Joe Williams, Dizzy Gillespie, Billy Eckstine, and Wynton Marsalis. Prior to coming to the University of Illinois, McNeill held similar academic positions at Florida International University and at Virginia Tech University.

Check out Chip McNeil’s MySpace.

Chip Stephens (Piano)
Sought after for his outstanding collaborative abilities, Chip Stephens can be heard on nearly 40 records and compact discs as a side-man and band leader. As a faculty member at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Mr. Stephens maintains a very diverse teaching and performing career at both the national and international levels. He has performed on four continents with some of the finest names in jazz, and frequently appears as a guest artist and clinician in the United States. A former faculty member at the University of Colorado at Boulder and Youngstown State University, many of Mr. Stephens’ students have received national and international recognition for their work. Chip performed on the Grammy Award winning CD by Arturo Sandoval, Hot House, and the Emmy Award winning sound track to For Love or Country, about the life of Sandoval. Stephens’ performing credits are many and include appearances with Eden Atwood, Michael Brecker, Jerry Brown, Kenny Burrell, Teresa Carroll, Clare Church, John Fedchock, Maynard Ferguson, Cutis Fuller, George Garzone, Greg Gisbert, The Woody Herman Orchestra, Milt Hinton, Red Holloway, Javon Jackson, Ingrid Jensen, Randy Johnston, Steve Kirby, Bill Kirchner, Ernie Krivda, Ralph Lalama, Tony Leonardi, Pete Lewis, Joe Lovano, The Glenn Miller Orchestra, Keith Oxman, Tito Puente, Nelson Rangell, Arturo Sandoval, Jack Schantz, Bobby Shew, Howie Smith, Clark Terry, Frank Tiberi, Roseanna Vitro, Bobby Watson, and Nathanial Yarbrough. Mr. Stephens is a Capri Records recording artist.

Jeff Helgesen (Trumpet)
Jeff Helgesen, a native and resident of Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, has been an active fixture in east central Illinois music circles for over twenty-five years. The son of a prominent local trumpet player, Helgesen began playing trumpet professionally in local dance bands at the age of 15, later studying music at the University of Illinois under Ray Sasaki while working actively as a freelance performer and studio musician. In 1987, Helgesen accepted a position as a featured soloist with the Ray Charles Orchestra, with whom he recorded and toured internationally until late 1990.

Helgesen’s credits include live performances with Aretha Franklin, Natalie Cole, Manhattan Transfer, Jon Faddis, Clark Terry, Louis Bellson, Jimmy Heath, Ed Thigpen, Pete Christlieb, Bill Watrous, and Anthony Braxton, as well as the Les Elgart and Tommy Dorsey Orchestras, and the Jazz Members Big Band of Chicago. He has recorded with such artists as Ray Charles, Anthony Braxton, Chicago pianist Joan Hickey, the Jazz Members Big Band of Chicago, Medicare 7-8-9, and the Craig Russo Latin Jazz Project.

Helgesen’s influences on the trumpet and flugelhorn include Louis Armstrong, Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, Kenny Dorham, Freddie Hubbard, Lee Morgan, Carl Saunders, and Woody Shaw. He is at equally at ease playing dixieland, bebop, big band, commercial pop music, and modern small group jazz.

Check out Jeff Helgesen’s MySpace.

Tito Carrillo (Trumpet)
Tito Carrillo joined the Illinois faculty in the Spring of 2006. He is a trumpeter, educator, bandleader, composer, and arranger, and since 1996 he has been a fixture in the Chicago jazz and Latin music scenes. The list of artists he has performed, recorded, and toured with is as varied as his skill set: Chicago heavyweights Willie Pickens, Bobby Broom, Patricia Barber, and Kurt Elling; big bands such as the Woody Herman Orchestra, Chicago Jazz Ensemble, Chicago Jazz Orchestra, and Smithsonian Masterworks Orchestra (directed by David Baker); jazz greats such as Toshiko Akiyoshi, Louis Hayes, Jon Faddis, and Vincent Herring; Salsa legends such as Andy Montañez, Tony Vega, and Cheo Feliciano; Latin jazz giants Tito Puente and Paquito D’Rivera; and pop icons Quincy Jones and Phil Collins. Carrillo has played some of the most prestigious venues in the world, including Chicago’s Symphony Center, Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center, and London’s Royal Albert Hall. His work has been heard at international jazz festivals in Chicago, Telluride, Montreux (Switzerland), North Sea Jazz Festival in The Hague (Netherlands), and Pori, Finland. As an educator, he served on the faculties at both the Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University, as well as Northwestern University prior to his appointment at Illinois. He has also brought his talents as an educator and performer to Chicago’s inner-city high schools through the Ravinia Festival’s community outreach program, the Ravinia Jazz Mentors. Of Carrillo, the Chicago Tribune states “he has acquired a reputation as a fluid improviser, doubly-blessed with a warm lyric style and technique to burn.” He continues to lead his own quintet in Chicago and throughout the Midwest, as well as being an active guest soloist and clinician at various secondary and collegiate jazz programs.

Josh Walden (Bass)
Recently returned from several years in Los Angeles, Josh Walden is one of the most versatile and respected bass players in the region. He works regularly on a wide variety of groups including Latin, funk, and straight-ahead jazz.

Jeff Magby (Drums, Congas)
Jeff is one of the region’s most in-demand musicians. Jeff lives in Urbana, IL, where he maintains a busy schedule teaching and performing a wide variety of music styles.

Other musicians that have appeared or recorded with The Craig Russo Latin Jazz Project include:
Carlos Vega, Ricardo Flores, Tim Green, Douglas Little, Simon Rowe, and Glenn Wilson.

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