September 2008, the Virginia Mayhew Septet performed at Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola as part of Jazz at Lincoln Center's "Diet Coke Women In Jazz Festival."
Virginia Mayhew (tenor sax), Harvie S (bass), Kenny Wessel (guitar), Victor Jones (drums), Lisa Parrott (baritone sax), Noah Bless (trombone) and Scott Harrell (trumpet).
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In July 2008, Virginia was an instructor at the Monterey Summer Jazz Camp in Monterey, CA. The camp is sponsored by the Monterey Jazz Festival (MFJ) and is an intensive immersion day program for young jazz students to learn and develop music skills and knowledge, with classes including big bands, small ensembles, vocal performance, instrumental master classes, and daily workshops on different music subjects.
NEWS | WINTER 2010 Virginia Mayhew Announces "Mary Lou Willimas: The Next 100 Years"
Virginia Mayhew is pleased to announce a forthcoming recording and tour, "Mary Lou Williams: The Next 100 Years", which will honor the 100th year anniversary of Mary Lou William's birth, (in 2010.) Virginia has arranged several of Mary Lou's original compositions, as well as tunes she played and recorded frequently, and will use two different quartets & instrumentation for touring; US-based Virginia Mayhew Quartet with Virginia Mayhew (tenor saxophone), Kenny Wessel (guitar), Harvie S (bass), and Victor Jones (drums) and European-based Virginia Mayhew/Tony Pancella Quartet with Virginia Mayhew (tenor sax), Tony Pancella (piano), Aldo Vigorito (bass), and Pietro Jodice (drums.)
In late 2009, Virginia and Italian jazz pianist Tony Pancella were considering various female jazz musicians on whom to focus for an upcoming Women In Jazz festival in Lucca, Italy. At some point Tony realized that 2010 was the 100th anniversary of Mary Lou Williams birth, and this project began.
"Although I was aware that Mary Lou Williams was a well-respected jazz musician," offered Virginia, "I was surprised by the depth and breadth of her career — composing and arranging for Andy Kirk and the Clouds of Joy in the 30's, arranging for Duke Ellington and Benny Goodman, recording with tenor giant Don Byas, and mentoring such Jazz giants as Monk, Bud Powell, Dizzy Gillespie and Bird (Charlie Parker), and all that in addition to leading her own groups. She covered every major style from Stride Piano to Big Band to Bebop and even touched on Free Jazz. There’s so much to be explored in her music, from an arranger's point of view, that I knew I had to do a bigger project than just a few arrangements for a single gig."
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NEWS | WINTER 2009 Virginia Featured in the Jan/Feb 2009 Issue of Chamber Music of America Magazine
Virginia, and five other of the world's leading female Jazz saxophonists, Laura Dreyer, Anat Cohen, Claire Daly, Jane Ira Bloom and Matana Roberts, were featured in the January/February 2009 issue of Chamber Music of America magazine. [Download the complete pdf artcle.]
