Jan. 15, 2003 – St. Croix jazz fans get their last chance — for now, anyhow — to hear Danish pianist Ben Besiakov perform — with his Crucian quartet colleagues — from 9 to 11 p.m. Saturday at Frederiksted's Pier 69.
Besiakov, born and raised in Copenhagen, is the grandson of Victor Cornelius, who was born in Frederiksted in 1898 and taken to Denmark seven years later, where he became an accomplished musician and head of a music school in the Danish town of Naskov.
Active on the Danish and world jazz scenes for three decades, Besiakov has performed with such luminaries as Dexter Gordon, Al Foster and Ben Webster. The Danish version of the Ben Besiakov Quartet was featured at last year's Oslo Jazz Festival.
On Saturday, Besiakov will be at the Pier 69 baby grand piano with Marcus Rabb on trumpet, Marsvyn David on bass and Al Fielder on drums. There's no cover charge.
As a child, Besiakov studied trumpet, flute and guitar. At 15, he was sitting in at jam sessions at Copenhagen's La Fontaine jazz club with saxophone greats Johnny Griffin and Gordon. In 1972, inspired by the music of Miles Davis, Carlos Santana and Jimi Hendrix, he and three friends formed the first Danish Latin/rock group, Buki Jamaz.
He made his professional debut as a pianist at the Montmartre jazz club and has since toured the world and appeared on more than a hundred recordings, including last year's CD "Why Don't We Play (Mack the Knife real slow and in minor)?"
Rabb was playing trumpet in local jazz bands while in high school in Baltimore, Maryland. He got his master's degree in music from Howard University and has performed with such top jazz artists as Wynton Marsalis, Milt Jackson and Joe Henderson. A St. Croix resident since 1997, he teaches music at Country Day School and privately.
David has written, produced and recorded numerous jingles heard on local airwaves and has had four of his songs recorded by the Howard University Jazz Band. He was band director for country singer Brenda Cole and is now music director for the Atlanta Latin band Orquesta Taboga and produced the group's latest CD.
Fielder did founding work with the Association for the Advancement of Creative Music in the 1960s. His trademark is an impeccable time with a laser-sharp sense of rhythm that is always there driving the music forward, but never rushes or gets in the way. The bands he has worked with read like a jazz timeline for the last 30 years, from his 1967 recording "Sound" with Roscoe Mitchell to 1998's "Southern Extreme."
To learn more about Saturday's performance, call 719-3672 or e-mail to Jazz One.
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