BAAMS’ Presents LIVE at Studio 9: BOULGER BLAKE BOENTE & LEWIS

We’re delighted to be kicking off the first concert of this 2024 Monthly Series BAAMS PRESENTS: LIVE AT Studio 9 at the Porches’ Inn. Join us for a special evening of music , a benefit performance for BAAMS — the Berkshires’ Academy for Advanced Musical Studies — featuring Richard Boulger, trumpet and flugelhorn, Alex Blake, bass, Dario Boente, piano and keyboards, and Tony Lewis, drums and percussion.

BAAMS’ Founder and Executive Director Richard Boulger is a North Adams native who spent 20 years teaching and working as a recording artist in New York City where he also worked with many of New York’s underserved communities’ schools before returning home in 2020. In 2022, BAAMS established its academy building in the Heritage State Park, North Adams. Boulger was a longtime private student and protégé of Trumpet legends Freddie Hubbard and Donald Byrd, and has recorded with such luminaries as The Allman Brothers Band, Randy Brecker, John Hicks, Trombonist Steve Davis, R&B legend “Joe”, and has produced three highly-acclaimed recording projects as a leader.

Alex Blake’s revolutionary playing style and technique combines his unique, innovative strumming, rapid, lyrical notations and percussive slaps on his bass to create a unique and compelling sound. Some have called Blake “an entire rhythm section”. His work with Sun Ra Arkestra, Randy Weston, Freddie Hubbard, Celia Cruz, McCoy Tyner, Billy Cobham, and hundreds more, is the stuff of legend.

Grammy and Latin-Grammy winner Argentinian born pianist and composer Dario Boente, is equally at home performing romantic Argentine and jazz compositions on a grand piano, as he is programming world-beat electronica. In 1999, Dario moved to New York City and has since released ten albums and compilations as a leader, featuring well-known Jazz musicians such as five-time Grammy Award winner Antonio Sanchez on drums, guitarist Ronny Jordan, Latin Grammy winner composer and pianist Fernando Otero, harmonica player Gregoire Maret, flutist Jorge Pardo, and saxophonist Miguel Zenon, among others.

Tony Lewis toured with Tony has toured, performed, and recorded with such music luminaries as Dizzy Gillespie, Benny Goodman, Sting, Little Richard, Sam & Dave, Cindy Lauper, The Temptations, Craig Harris, and many more.

Studio 9 is the perfect setting for this intimate concert, a structure Richard Boulger describes as “a musical instrument unto itself.” With gorgeous, pure acoustics competing only with the lovely views of the campus of North Adams’ Porches’ Inn, and MASS MoCA directly across the river, this meeting of the musical minds is sure to sell out.

All proceeds will help support music education at BAAMS, which provides after-school and Saturday music study, as well as a summer jazz-band day camp for students ages 10-18, of all experience levels. BAAMS also contributes to the region’s cultural richness in celebration of music and the arts through its various events presented throughout the year. For more information, contact: 413-663-4424 or message to: [email protected].