It is fun to see where the lives of those who touch us musically take them when they are not performing in Wilmington at our festival. You can check on many of them by going to their websites and see the interesting places they are playing and with whom—but here is one interesting tidbit that you might not know about.
The talented young violin prodigy, Jonathan Russell, who performed here for the first time in 2007, was asked back due to popular demand in 2008 and again in 2011, has really branched out in different directions with his amazing talents!
This summer when I was in NYC I went to a one woman show “One Night With Fanny Brice” (which by the way, was marvelous) the orchestra was made up of two musicians – a piano and a violin – yes, the violinist was Jonathan Russell! What a treat to see “our Jonathan” in that setting, and doing so well.
Another of his many interests is film scoring. He has studied film scoring with Julliard professor Sam Zyman and film composer Ira Newborn from NYU. He scored his first short film, “Radio Hate” at the age of 15. Most recently he received an additional music credit for the Bollywood film “Aarakshan”, which was directed by Prakash Jha. In July of this year, Jonathan wrote a demo for the new Hollywood Brass instrument library – the only non “in the house” composer to be asked to contribute. He is currently composing music for a streaming film, “Arella”, produced by Rubichouse, due to be released in early 2012. Jonathan’s latest credit is the scoring of a 25 minute short film Soul Keeper (poster below) which is being shown at the Burlington VT film festival in October 2011.
Jonathan created his own You Tube channel a year ago (jdrcomposer.com), which currently has well over 600 subscribers. To learn more about Jonathan visit his website www.jonathanjazz.com
To see him perform locally come to the North Carolina Jazz Festival on Feb. 6, 7 & 8, 2013, we are planning ahead so we are sure to have him here while it is still an option — who knows where the future will lead this talented young man!
In answer to your requests—in 2012 we will be adding a dance floor for those who love to “move with the beat”. Swing dancing is a “new/old phenomenon” that seems to be really catching on—and what better style of music to swing-dance to than Traditional Jazz?
