Jeff Rupert

Jeff Rupert (born September 6, 1964) is a Yamaha performing artist, a record producer, recording artist, freelance tenor saxophonist, full-time professor, and Director of Jazz Studies at the University of Central Florida (UCF).^[1][2]

Discography

• Do That Again - with The Jazz Professors (2013)
• Jazz Town with the UCF Jazz Ensemble 1 (2012)
• From Memphis to Mobile - Jeff Rupert with Kenny Drew, Jr. (2009)
• Save Your Love For Me - Jeff Rupert + Dirty Martini (2004)
• Jeff Rupert - self-titled album (2003)
• Superstar - The Fins - MAS Records, (2000)^[3]
• Don't Look Back for T-Bone Orchard (2003)^[4]
• Harlem Renaissance -for Benny Carter
• Swingin' for Schuur - for Diane Schuur
• Christmas Songs for Mel Tormé
• The Great American Songbook: Live at Michael's Pub for Mel Tormé

Biography

Rupert has been a featured soloist on dozens of recordings with artists like Maynard Ferguson, Sam Rivers, Mel Tormé, Diane Schuur and Benny Carter. He played on Carter's Harlem Renaissance which won a GRAMMY. He played with the New Jersey-based Blues band The Fins.^[5] He has also played with Kevin Mahogany, Ernestine Anderson, Joe Farnsworth, Ray Drummond, pianist Benny Green, Kenny Drew Jr., trumpeter Michael Philip Mossman, and pianist and singer Judy Carmichael^[6]

Rupert was selected to perform in the Jaguar International Jazz Series in New Zealand where he worked with Joe La Barbera, Larry Koonse, John Fedchock, and Tom Warrington.^[6]

He founded the band Jeff Rupert + Dirty Martini, with which he recorded the Bossa album "Save Your Love For Me" (2004). "From the moment I first heard Jeff Rupert with my band," said Ferguson, "I considered him one of the great jazz players of today."^[7]

He received his Masters in Jazz Studies from Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University in 1993, and his Bachelor of Music in Jazz Studies from Mason Gross School of the Arts in 1987.

Rupert currently is the leader of The Jazz Professors, a sextet which had top JazzWeek charting hit albums in 2012 and 2013. "The Jazz Professors: Live at the UCF-Orlando Jazz Festival" (Flying Horse, 2011) which and peaked at #19 during its seventeen weeks on the JazzWeek charts. His third album, "From Memphis to Mobile"(CDBY), with Kenny Drew, Jr.

On December 6 2013 he appeared and recorded with the Happy Feet Jazz Band in Brazil on a live album recorded at the Cine Theatro Brasil in Belo Horizonte, Brazil ^[8]

He tours with Kevin Mahogany, Harry Allen's Four Others, Ernestine Anderson, and Judy Carmichael, among others.

Rupert joined the Sam Rivers Band in 1996 and appeared in four recordings with the band. He has performed in hundreds of appearances with them including performances at Lincoln Center for Ed Bradley's Jazz from Lincoln Center (broadcast on NPR), the Vision Festival, NYC and Columbia University. He has been a member of the Jaguar International Jazz Series alongside Joe La Barbera, Larry Koonse, John Fedchock, and Tom Warrington.

He played with Ronnie Burrage in Band Burrage in 2004.

As Sideman

Rupert has played for:

• Maynard Ferguson
• Sam Rivers
• Mel Tormé
• Diane Schuur
• Benny Carter
• Ernestine Anderson
• Kevin Mahogany
• Benny Green
• Ray Drummond
• Joe Farnsworth
• Ronnie Burrage
• T-Bone
• Kenny Drew Jr.
• Judy Carmichael

Major Performances

Rupert has performed at:

• Alice Tully Hall
• Aruba Jazz Festival, Bishopstock, Devon, England
• The Blue Note
• Chicago Blues Festival
• The Guinness Jazz Festival, Cork, Ireland
• The Jazz Standard
• Jamaica Jazz Festival
• The Kennedy Center
• Jubileums Blues Festival, Hamar, Norway
• Lucerne Jazz Festival
• Montreaux Jazz Festival
• Pori Jazz Festival, Finland
• The Tokyo Forum

He has played at jazz festivals around the world, missing only Africa, to date, with dates in Europe, Scandinavia, Japan, Israel, South America, Australia, and New Zealand.^[9][10]

As Music Educator

As a full professor and Director of Jazz Studies at the University of Central Florida, Rupert spearheaded a jazz major at UCF, and recruited a top-drawer faculty that includes legendary jazz drummer Marty Morell. He is the musical director of The Flying Horse Big Band, which began as the UCF Jazz Ensemble 1. He also runs their Jazz Workshop, teaches a course "The Evolution of Jazz" and serves as a private instructor/mentor to selected jazz saxophone students at the university.

Rupert is a frequent clinician for festivals, college, high school, and middle school music performance assessments (MPAs) and music education clinics for music educators at events like the Florida Music Educators Association annual conference in Tampa, Florida.

As Producer

Rupert is the founder of Flying Horse Records, a record label created to promote the talent of both the students and the recording artists in the faculty of the University of Central Florida's Jazz Studies program, and a keystone of the rising Jazz department's mission to make the university's Jazz department a launching point for modern jazz artists.

He founded and produces the UCF Orlando Jazz Festival, which has been broadcast by Dee Dee Bridgewater on her Jazz Set program that appears on Sirius/XM radio and NPR.

He has produced several records featuring his students in the UCF Jazz Ensemble 1. Their recording Jazz Town topped out at 43 on the JazzWeek chart. The Blues Is Alright, their 2013 release, topped out at 35^[11]

References