Celebrity Series of Boston will present Mack Avenue SuperBand featuring Gary Burton, vibraphone, Tia Fuller saxophone, Sean Jones trumpet, and the Christian McBride Trio on Thursday, February 4, 2016 at 8pm at Berklee Performance Center, 136 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston

(Boston) Celebrity Series of Boston will present Mack Avenue SuperBand featuring Gary Burton, vibraphone, Tia Fuller saxophone, Sean Jones trumpet, and the Christian McBride Trio on Thursday, February 4, 2016 at 8pm at Berklee Performance Center, 136 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston. Sponsored by Donna and Mike Egan and Tufts Health Plan.

Tickets start at $40, and are available online at www.celebrityseries.org, by calling CelebrityCharge at (617) 482-6661 Monday-Friday 10:00 a.m.- 4:00 p.m., or at the Berklee Performance Center box office, 136 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston.

This performance marks the Celebrity Series of Boston debut of Mack Avenue SuperBand. The Celebrity Series first presented Gary Burton in his Hot House Tour with Chick Corea in October 2012; the Christian McBride Trio made their Celebrity Series debut in February 2015 with Cecile McLroin Slavant. This performance will be the Celebrity Series debut for both Tia Fuller and Sean Jones.

The Mack Avenue SuperBand has become synonymous with stellar line-ups consisting of established and up and coming jazz artists with pronounced identities and original grooves. This year’s group presented exclusively for the 2015-2016 season and featuring Gary Burton and Christian McBride as musical directors tops them all.

Seven-time GRAMMY® Award winning vibraphonist and jazz legend Gary Burton made his first recordings at age seventeen, and has toured and recorded with a who’s who of famous jazz masters including Chick Corea, Pat Metheny, and Stan Getz to name a few. His stature as the former Executive Vice President at the Berklee College of Music caps a three-decade life in jazz education, which coincided with his already busy career as a performer and recording artist. Known for reintroducing and expanding the technique of four-mallet playing while crafting one of the jazz world’s signature sounds, he is also celebrating the 40th anniversary of his ongoing collaboration with pianist Chick Corea.

Saxophonist Tia Fuller is at home at all points of the music spectrum – from her show-stopping solos as a member of superstar Beyoncé’s all-female band, to her scintillatingly swinging jazz dates and recordings. For this season’s Super Band, Fuller brings her fire and punch, rhythmic freedom and drive, and her youthful twisting of genres she’s gained from a life in both top-of-the-charts pop and jazz. After five years in Beyoncé’s band, the pop diva’s attention to detail in the studio rubbed off on Fuller. She has since developed a heightened focus in the editing, mixing and mastering process of Angelic Warrior, as the producer. And as the Assistant Musical Director for Esperanza Spalding’s Radio Music Society touring band, Fuller applies her pop and jazz chops on behalf of some of the hottest artists in music today.

Sean Jones plays the trumpet with intense immediacy and urgency, hewing to the jazz tradition, but moving the music forward at the same time. After stepping down from his longtime position as Lead Trumpeter of the Jazz At Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis and then touring with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock’s Tribute To Miles, Sean has established himself as a formidable leader through his recordings and live performances. Education is also a major element in Sean’s ongoing activities. Shortly after joining the JLCO he began teaching at Duquesne University in his adopted hometown of Pittsburgh, where he is currently Associate Professor of Jazz. In 2012 he also became Professor of Trumpet at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. In addition, master classes and clinics are a regular part of his activities, providing more than a dozen annually all around the world. Despite this intense level of activity, Sean also serves as Artistic Director of both the Pittsburgh and Cleveland Jazz Orchestras, overseeing their annual four concert and six concert series, respectively. Equally committed as an activist and advocate, Sean is focused upon trying to organize the various jazz orchestras all over the country to offer this glorious art form in as rich, substantive and compelling a manner as possible.

The foundation of the Super Band is musical director and bassist Christian McBride with his compatriots, pianist Christian Sands and drummer Ulysses Owens, Jr. Both of these younger emerging artists have been performing in McBride’s Trio for three years, honing their conception to a fine point of expressive depth and nuance through select performances around the world. McBride has worked with artists such as Freddie Hubbard, Sonny Rollins, J.J. Johnson, Ray Brown, Milt Jackson, McCoy Tyner, Roy Haynes, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock and Pat Metheny. In the R&B world, he has played with and arranged for Isaac Hayes, Chaka Khan, Natalie Cole, Lalah Hathaway, and James Brown. In the pop/rock world, he has collaborated with Sting, Carly Simon, Don Henley, and Bruce Hornsby. In hip-hop, he has worked with the Roots, D’Angelo, and Queen Latifah. In other projects, he’s worked with opera legend Kathleen Battle, bassist Edgar Meyer, the Shanghai Quartet and the Sonus Quartet.

Program to be announced from stage.

About Celebrity Series of Boston
Celebrity Series of Boston was founded in 1938 by pianist and impresario Aaron Richmond. Over the course of its 77-year history, Celebrity Series has presented an array of the world’s greatest performing artists. The Celebrity Series of Boston believes in the power of excellence and innovation in the performing arts to enrich life experiences, transform lives and build better communities. Through its education initiatives, the Celebrity Series seeks to build a community of Greater Boston where the performing arts are a valued, lifelong, shared experience–on stages, in schools, at home– everywhere. For more information on Celebrity Series of Boston, call (617) 482-2595 or visit us online at www.celebrityseries.org.

The Celebrity Series of Boston, Inc. receives generous support from Amy & Joshua Boger, Leslie & Howard Appleby, The Garbis & Arminé Barsoumian Charitable Foundation, the Boston Cultural Council, the Stephanie L. Brown Foundation, Charlesbank Capital Partners LLC, the Susanne Marcus Collins Foundation, Deloitte LLP, Donna & Mike Egan, EMC, Foley & Lardner LLP, Gabor Garai & Susan Pravda, David & Harriet Griesinger, the Charles and Cerise Jacobs Charitable Foundation, Paul L. King, The Royal Little Family Foundation, the Massachusetts Cultural Council, Joseph McNay, Stewart Myers, the National Endowment for the Arts, Eleanor & Frank Pao, The Peabody Foundation, PTC, The John S. and Cynthia Reed Foundation, The D.L. Saunders Real Estate Corp., the Stifler Family Foundation, Mr. and Mrs. Henri A. Termeer, Michael and Susan Thonis, Tufts Health Plan, Sanjay & Sangeeta Verma, Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Nancy Richmond Winsten, Anonymous, and many others.