Echando Los Santos is an exploration of Alfredo Colón’s Dominican heritage. Culturally rooted in his family’s migration to the United States, with all of the complexities that move entailed and continues to produce. It is inspired by the country’s rich folklore and many of the characters surrounding it.
“Te estoy echando los santos” is a phrase Colón’s mother would say with every single goodbye. It translates to “I’m casting the saints”. This was his mother’s way of sending him off with love and protection against everything that could cause him harm. This performance is not only a tribute to his immediate family but a way of sending that same love to all that surrounds him.
Alfredo Colon: saxophone
Kalia Vandever: trombone
Jacob Sacks: piano
Hannah Marks: bass
Connor Parks: drums
Dominican-American saxophonist and composer, Alfredo Colón is a proud New York City native. His distinct sound lives at the crossroads of a wide range of experiences and inspirations, from his upbringing in Upper Manhattan, to his Dominican heritage, to his love of musicians with melodic approaches to improvisation, including Sonny Sharrock, Ornette Coleman, and Pharoah Sanders. In early 2020, Colon was awarded the Jazz Coalition Commission fund Grant. He premiered his piece ‘A Witch Gets Married’ in October of that same year. The piece is a meditation on the way that the ethereal and the mundane are seamlessly woven together in Dominican folklore, and is inspired by some of the mysterious characters who appear in the stories. Colon has performed in esteemed venues such as The Appel Room at Jazz at Lincoln Center, Birdland Jazz Club, The Bop Stop, The Blue Llama, The Jazz Gallery, and myriad others. He has also participated in festivals including Afropunk, The Outsiders Creative and Improvised Music Festival and The Composers Now festival. Colon has performed alongside distinguished musicians such as Dr Lonnie Smith, Jamaaladeen Tacuma, Nels Cline, Lenny White, Gene Lake, and many others.
Kalia Vandever is a trombonist, composer, and educator living in Brooklyn, NY. Kalia received her Bachelor of Music degree in Jazz Studies at the Juilliard School in 2017. She has toured and performed internationally with her quartet, as well as a side-woman, performing with artists including Joel Ross, Maria Grand, Darcy James Argue’s Secret Society and others. She has performed in such venues as Carnegie Hall, Sydney Opera House, Walt Disney Concert Hall, Preservation Hall, the Hollywood Bowl, The Jazz Gallery, The Blue Whale, Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola, SMOKE Jazz Club, the Blue Note, and the Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center. She has also performed on Saturday Night Live with Demi Lovato and on Samantha Bee’s Full Frontal with Lizzo.
Jacob Sacks is one of the most creative pianists on the NYC jazz scene today. For over 25 years both in NYC and beyond, his strong individual voice has been heard in a variety of settings ranging from the mainstream jazz traditions of the Mingus Big Band and Orchestra to the open approach of the Paul Motian Septet and Octet(+1) to the vamp based fusion of David Binney’s Balance. Jacob has performed with musicians such as Lee Konitz, Clark Terry, Joe Maneri, Terumasa Hino, Charles Gayle, Eddie Henderson, Tim Berne, Michael Formanek, Tom Rainey, Ralph Alessi, Ben Monder, Rich Perry, Chris Potter, Mark Turner, Adam Rogers, and Matt Wilson, and has also done collaborations with artists such as Orlando Hernandez, Eric Wubbels, Ethan Iverson, Karen Ng, and Liz Kosack.
Hannah Marks is a bassist, bandleader, composer, and educator living in New York City. As a bandleader, she has performed at several major festivals, including the Detroit Jazz Festival, Hyde Park Jazz Festival, Iowa City Jazz Festival, and Indy Jazz Festival. Her current band, Hannah Marks: Outsider, Outlier, is a genre-defying, lyric-based project. Marks plays in many bands including Tide Pools, with alto saxophonist Alfredo Colon and drummer Connor Parks, as well as for singer-songwriters Elora and Jack Broza. She is a frequent sideman with Geoffrey Keezer, Ingrid Jensen, Kalia Vandever, Matt Wilson, Ted Nash, Morgan Guerin, and Marcus Printup. Her former project, Heartland Trio, released their debut album in November 2018. Marks is a 2021 alumnus of the Woodshed Network, a 2019 alumnus of Betty Carter Jazz Ahead, a 2018 alumnus of the Banff International Workshop in Jazz and Creative Music, and a 2014 alumnus of the Brubeck Summer Jazz Colony.
Connor Parks is from Orlando, FL, where he began studying drums & percussion with Beth and Danny Gottlieb. Connor received a BFA in Jazz studies from the New School for Jazz & Contemporary Music in New York City, where he was instructed by Jane Ira Bloom, Reggie Workman, & Dave Douglas, and privately studied with Matt Wilson, Johnathan Blake, Aaron Parks, Matt Brewer, Harish Raghavan, Amir Ziv, Ben Street, Gilad Hekselman, and Dayna Stephens. Upon arriving in New York City, Connor has performed with Rodney Jones, Vic Juris, Darius Jones, Linda Briceño, Dave Glasser, JD Allen, Ingrid Jensen, Aaron Parks, Mcklopedia, and Kandace Springs, among many others. He has appeared at venues ranging from the Blue Note to Madison Square Garden, and often performs at Music Festivals both internationally and in the United States.
