New Years Eve extravaganza with the legendary guitarist Rodney Jones (Lena Horne, Maceo Parker, Quincy Jones, etc) and his incredible band featuring the earth shatteringly soulful vocals of the one and the only Joy Brown! A four-course prix fix meal, champagne toast, party favors and two magnificent sets of live music at 9pm and 11pm! Our favorite night of the year at Uncle Cheef and we cannot wait to festivate with you!
*Your non refundable ticket purchase reserves your seat for the entire evening. Your table minimum for the night includes a four course prix fix meal, champagne toast and party favors at $100/person. Additional beverages are a la carte. Tax and gratuity not included.
Master guitarist Rodney Jones has toured worldwide, performed and recorded with a who’s who of music including Dizzy Gillespie, James Brown, Lena Horne, Quincy Jones, Christian McBride, Stevie Wonder, Elvin Jones, Kenny Burrell, Stan Getz, and countless others. He was the house guitarist for the Apollo Theatre for 9 years, and the staff guitarist for the Rosie O’Donnell Show for 6 years. He has written commercials and has more than 125 compositions recorded. He recently scored a documentary film for PBS about African American GIs in WW2. He served as Musical Director/Producer for Lena Horne, Ruth Brown, Gloria Lynne, Ernestine Anderson and others.. He has been a professor of Jazz Guitar Studies at The Juilliard School for 12 years and at The Manhattan School of Music for more than 20 years and has conducted clinics and workshops worldwide.
His highly popular Blue Note album “Soul Manifesto” is widely regarded as one of the most important works in modern history. How lucky are we to have this rare appearance in person to hear this music LIVE at Uncle Cheef?! Featuring a battleship band of the world’s finest musicians you’re gonna want to get your tickets early for this one, folks.
Joy Brown is the favorite vocalist of a great number of jazz fans and musicians on the NYC scene. A native of Newark, NJ. Joy F. Brown received her initial musical training in the Pentacostal church under the tutelage of her father, a singer and musician. She began singing solos at the age of five; and it was in the church that Joy tapped into the ability to "feel the spirit" of a song. Since moving to New York City Miss Brown can be found bringing the house down at venues such as Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola, The Django, Mezzrow, Smalls and more with the likes of Barry Harris, Sullivan Fortner, Grant Stewart, Michael Weiss, Bruce Harris and others.
Born and raised in Newark NJ, Joy’s introduction to music came through her parents. “My whole family is musical – my father was a big advocate of music growing up, there were always instruments around; a piano, fender Rhodes, guitars. Music was life to my father, a Pentecostal preacher. He was very strict in that secular music was not allowed at home though I heard it at friends or cousins’ houses. I grew up with lots of gospel. My parents grew up during the depression and I listened to a lot of music from that era. The Dixie hummingbirds, Sam Cooke and the Soul stirrers, 5 blind boys of Mississippi, Roberta martin singers. The gospel sound of Chicago particularly. The elders of the upper Midwest came from the south”
Joy attended the High School of performing arts in NJ (where she learned afterward that Sarah Vaughan attended the same alma matter) and then went on to study engineering in college. Years later, Joy went back to education to study music where she was immersed in classical music. “Studying classical and growing up in the church, jazz is the perfect landing spot – like goldilocks – jazz is the perfect combination – it’s the technicality of classical but the soul, improvisational and depth of the gospel”. “My exposure to jazz is really only a couple of years old. WBAI talk radio, Grandpa Munster had a show on Saturdays that I would listen to every week. Around Nina Simone’s birthday he played a song called “images” – her voice grabbed me. Unaccompanied. He talked a bit about her – they developed a good friendship as activists. I went to Barnes and Noble and purchased her album and I put it in my Discman. I repeated “I love you Porgy” over and over and over. I needed to hear more of this. “Black brown and Beige” was the next purchase, which I felt I could get away with playing in the house. “Blues in Orbit” featured Mahalia Jackson, which was just about ok with my father! Many artists, Coltrane, Washington etc started in the church. That’s why I'm grateful for my upbringing. I don’t consider myself religious but I learned about the presence of feeling something deeper. It’s that intangible tangible. With good authentic music you will always feel something.”
Fast-forward to 2015 and a friend volunteered Joy to sing at a café for seniors. “I didn’t know what to sing so I sang the music of their day. I didn’t know anything about the etiquette or even how to sing the songs, I just went from lyrics on an Ipad. It was then I realized that I sounded like Dinah Washington. My favorite singer growing up was Gloria Griffin of the Roberta martin singers. She had the ability to sound gruff and then also become very small and intricate in how she sang.” So someone heard me and I got invited to a jam session, Nov 2015. I fell in love with the live music, which connected me back to the Pentecostal church. It was nice to be in an environment where musicians played music live. I was invited to Winard Harpers’ jam session on Fridays in Jersey. He said ‘you need to go to NYC and go study with Barry Harris’. I looked him up, went to a workshop and it changed my life. I remember walking in and thinking how can I learn in a room full of people. I sat there and listened and the things he said were so vital I went every Tuesday for 2 years. He is truly the keeper of the bebop flame. Murray Wall and Richard Clements, they took me under their wing (Monday night’s at 11th st bar) – Murray invited me over to his house and taught me songs, tempos, keys etc. For that reason they were like guardian angels to me. I met Rome Neal – he gave me my first gig at the Nuyorican poets’ café in the west village, which I stumbled through but he believed in me.”
Despite her late start, Joy remarks that whilst she is aware of the difficulties of being a woman in jazz, they are not her experiences. “I came into it older, I wasn’t a young girl so I think that changes things a bit. Not only that, I made up in my mind that I needed other musicians to respect me as a musician. I curbed the BS and got straight to the music. There have been one or two isolated incidents but I grew up around strong male influences so I’ve never been too much of a diva and I think that was appreciated – I just get on with it. Joy also spoke of the importance of KEYEDUP! to the city and also candidly about the difficulties of pursuing music full-time “I'm very grateful for KU – they supplement many venues that would like to be involved but cant. It’s important that we receive fair payment and also that we are treated well – we are providing the ambiance. Jazz is probably the one genre that you have to be in love with – you’re very lucky if you can make a living from it. I quit it 3 times a day – when the bills are there, there was a point where I was sleeping on park benches because I was determined to make this jazz thing work. Every time I would make my mind up to quit I would hear something new or sit in on a good set and be reinvigorated. I remember listening to “She” – a George Sharing tune at 11th St bar that did something to me. It was amazing. I felt like I was transcending time and space. I closed my eyes and went somewhere else. Moments like that make you realize that you can’t give it up. Corporations are pushing the pop industry; do I sell my soul to become less than I know is pure to pay my bills? As musicians we ask ourselves this question over and over. It’s definitely a love affair.
Featuring: RODNEY JONES: guitar / JOY BROWN: vocals / WILL BOULWARE: Hammond B-3 organ / LONNIE PLAXICO: bass / RUSSELL CARTER: drums
Doors Open at 7:30 PM | Sets at 9 PM & 11 PM
One ticket ($75–$125, based on seating) reserves your table for the entire evening.
Please note: In addition to the ticket price, there is a $100 per person table minimum, which includes:
A four-course prix fixe meal
A champagne toast
Party favors to ring in the night
Additional beverages are available à la carte. Tax and gratuity are not included.
Your ticket ensures your table is reserved, while the table minimum guarantees a delicious dining experience to accompany the show!