Mark Brandt
Mark Brandt
Genres: piano, jazz
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About Mark Brandt
If there is a formula for success to be found in obscurity then the eclectic, jazz pianist and composer Mark Brandt has discovered it. At age 6, Mark's family relocated from San Diego, California to Northern Virginia, where he began to develop his musical talent and ability. His first professional club gig was at a piano bar in McClean, Virginia when he was just 15 years old. By the age of 18 Mark was playing jazz, fusion, and pop music for a living. In 1979, Mark graduated from high school and attended Catholic University as a classical piano performance major, working nights and weekends as a professional keyboardist with a local jazz and pop group. After three years at CU, he entered the Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts where he completed his formal education studying jazz composition and arranging. In 1984, after leaving Boston, Mark began working full time as a freelance keyboardist in a variety of musical groups which took him from Vermont to Florida to Georgia and finally to Washington, D.C. where he relocated in 1987. Within a short time Mark was playing solo piano every night of the week, as well as playing with a trio on Friday and Saturday nights and Sunday brunches. In between, he attended jam sessions all over the Northern Virginia/D.C. area. In 1992, at the urging of childhood friend and woodwind player, Geoff Thaler, Mark added teaching at the music store which Thaler owned to his roster of musical endeavors. In 1994, he released Warmup, a jazz trio recording, which featured bassist Glen Harris and drummer Stan McMullen, and in 1995, Mark officially formed and began to work regularly with the first Mark Brandt Trio. Between 1995 and 2000, Mark worked within many different musical situations, regularly returning to the jazz trio format. He released Veritas (1995), In Spirit (1996), and Suite for a Fish Out of Water (1997). All three projects were successfully marketed and sold through Christopher Productions (now known as Lionheart Music), the independent record label which Mark co-founded with Geoff Thaler. Several of Mark's compositions were promoted and heard on jazz radio stations all across America. To this day his music can be heard on radio stations all over the globe. As the year 2000 began, Mark abruptly halted his recording and performing career in order to spend more time with his family. During the years that followed, he continued to teach and work as a clinician from his home studio, focusing his creative energy on the proliferation of his students. His former students now span the United States in every area of the music business, as well as on scholarship or advanced placement in some of the country's finest musical institutions. In June of 2007, Mark released new solo piano pieces on a CD entitled The Lion. Like Veritas, from ten years earlier, the pieces on The Lion feature Mark's love for spontaneity as they are unedited first-take recordings. Mark is a deeply spiritual man, and a devout Catholic. His music conveys an "other worldly" sound which has found an enthusiastic response among Jazz, Classical, New Age, World Music, and Christian Music lovers alike. In January 2008, this accomplished pianist teamed with friends, Nate Panning on drums and Shaun Jurek on bass, to form a new jazz trio. A veteran musician to the D.C. scene himself, Panning was the drummer in the trio prior to Mark's hiatus. Jurek, a former student of Mark's, has been working and teaching throughout the D.C. area since he graduated from college in 2002. The trio practices and works regularly together as performers and as a clinician team. In April of 2008, Mark released a CD featuring duets with jazz guitarist, Dan Leonard, and duets with woodwind player, Geoff Thaler. The duets between Brandt and Leonard are more recent compositions which blend well with the duets between Brandt and Thaler, which are reissues from Mark's earlier projects with Thaler who passed away in 2003. On December 11, 2009, Mark was back in the studio recording 7 new solo piano improvisations. They were released in February of 2010 on a CD entitled From the Heart of a Warrior. This project completes a trilogy of solo piano recordings which, in Mark's own words, "has brought closure to an entire era of my life as both an artist and as a person, while opening the door to a whole new world of creative possibilities." Between 2009 and 2010, the Mark Brandt Jazz Trio was the primary creative outlet for Mark as the trio grew steadily in popularity with performances throughout the Washington D.C., Virginia, and Maryland area. The trio released Worth The Wait in September, 2010 and culminated another active year of jazz dates with a half hour set of Christmas music at the National Christmas Tree in Washington D.C. on December 23, 2010. Without leaving the east coast of the United States, Mark has tenaciously carved out a unique and creative niche in the world of instrumental and improvisational music. He is continually collaborating with musicians from every genre functioning as both studio musician and producer. He has served as a respected music educator and clinician for 20 years. Brandt says that he enjoys the challenge of becoming known while remaining hidden. He has continually made his family the priority over every opportunity to become more famous stating that "sharing one's music with as many people as possible is completely different than pushing for fame." "Entertainers," says Mark, "are popular. Artists are loved." While managing to remain active as both a local performer, and an international recording artist, Mark Brandt is a living example to both music lovers and musicians alike that the the measure of an artist is not found in how well known he is, but how well he is loved by those who know him.
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