Home » Jazz Musicians » James Zollar

James Zollar

James Delano Zollar began his musical career at age 9 playing bugle in his hometown, Kansas City Missouri. At 12, he graduated to the trumpet where he began to discover his musical voice and focus. After high school he continued to study at San Diego City College and then the University of California at San Diego. At the same time he honed his chops with various funk and jazz bands and lead his own straight-ahead quintet. In 1972, Zollar moved to San Francisco and he studied with the great jazz trumpet player Woody Shaw to study jazz improvisation. In, 1984, he moved to New York City and played with the Cecil McBee Quintet for five years and then recorded with Tom Harrell, with Weldon Erving and Sam Rivers. Zollar was featured in Robert Altman’s motion picture “Kansas City”, in Madonna’s music video “My Baby’s Got a Secret”, as well as Malcolm Lee’s film “The Best Man”. He played on the sound truck of “The Perez Family” and is proud to be included in The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz (Oxford University Press 1999.). James was also a featured soloist with Jon Faddis and Carnegie Hall Jazz Orchestra as well as Wynton Marsalis and The Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra. He remains New York based where he stands out in a wide range of musical settings. Today, he’s playing with The Duke Ellington Orchestra, working with several of Don Byron’s Bands, and also working with NYC Blues Devil. "James is a really nice guy and very personal-sounding cat with a unique approach. He’s absorbed the history of the music, and he plays it with great care and warmth. And he doesn’t try to sound like anyone else” says Ravi Coltrane his periodic jam-session partner.


Tags

14
Album Review

Danny Jonokuchi Big Band: A Decade

Read "A Decade" reviewed by Jack Bowers


For trumpeter, vocalist and bandleader Danny Jonokuchi, the path to success--in music and in life--has never been smooth or trouble-free. Born with a congenital lung disease, Jonokuchi needed life-saving surgery while in high school to treat a collapsed lung, which caused him to put his trumpet playing aside, at least temporarily. Years later, and almost a continent away from his native Los Angeles, Jonokuchi was viciously attacked in south Philadelphia, resulting in traumatic injuries to his mouth and embouchure. This ...

5
Album Review

Danny Jonokuchi: A Decade

Read "A Decade" reviewed by Pierre Giroux


A Decade is arranger-composer, trumpeter and vocalist Danny Jonokuchi's celebration of personal and musical evolution, encapsulating his growth over the last ten years as a musician and leader of his big band. The album draws on jazz's rich traditions while also serving as a reflection of the enduring spirit of the genre. The release features compositions that outline the signature flourish of Jonokuchi's writing, standing as a testament to his ability to overcome personal obstacles. The ...

14
Album Review

Eyal Vilner Big Band: Swingin' Uptown

Read "Swingin' Uptown" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Even though he was born and raised in Tel Aviv, Israel, composer, saxophonist and educator Eyal Vilner is well-versed in the origins and history of American jazz, especially as they pertain to the Swing Era, big bands and the largely black jazz experience in Harlem and elsewhere. Those interests converge on Swingin' Uptown, on which Vilner's excellent big band swings its way through sixteen impressive charts, several of which were inspired by Harlem's remarkble jazz narrative. Besides ...

37
Album Review

Eyal Vilner Big Band: The Jam!

Read "The Jam!" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Simply leading a big band in 2022 is cause for celebration. Leading a big band as sharp and talented as Eyal Vilner's New York- based ensemble is cause for far more than that. Vilner, an Israeli-born composer, arranger and woodwind specialist, formed the band in 2008, one year after arriving in New York City. He has been busy since then shaping its identity and refining its style, and his persistence pays off big-time on the band's second album, The Jam! ...

23
Album Review

Andy Farber and His Orchestra: Early Blue Evening

Read "Early Blue Evening" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Saxophonist Andy Farber's New York-based orchestra came together and cut its teeth as the onstage band for three hundred performances of After Midnight, a Broadway revue that paid tribute to Jazz Age nightclub luminaries from Duke Ellington, Jimmie Lunceford and Count Basie to Harold Arlen, Dorothy Fields and Jimmy McHugh. As one might presume from the orchestra's provenance, echoes of Ellington and Basie can readily be discerned on its first recording since After Midnight closed in 2014--but Farber, who wrote ...

173
Album Review

James Zollar: Zollar System

Read "Zollar System" reviewed by Raul d'Gama Rose


It is an unfortunate fact that trumpeter James Zollar is nowhere near as well-known as he should be. But that may be about to change. Zollar Systems may be about to put Zollar in an orbit all his own. A genuine renaissance man of the horn, Zollar is a singular voice on the instrument that is jazz music's vanguard accouterment--the one that heralded the legend of Buddy Bolden and those of Joe Oliver, Louis Armstrong, Jabbo Smith and Bubber Miley, ...

349
Album Review

James Zoller: Zollar System

Read "Zollar System" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey


James Zollar is a musical treasure hidden in plain sight. He has played and recorded as a sideman for a variety of artists, including Cecil McBee, Tom Harrell, Weldon Irving and Sam Rivers, as a member of Wynton Marsalis' brass section in the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, The Duke Ellington Orchestra and several of Don Byron's bands. While he leads his own mainstream-oriented quintet, Zollar has recorded only one collection, the very fine Soaring With Bird (Naxos Jazz, 1998).

Twelve ...

Read more articles

Performance / Tour

The Blue Room On Historic 18th And Vine Line Up For July 30th- August 4th

The Blue Room On Historic 18th And Vine Line Up For July 30th- August 4th

Source: C. L. Burnett, American Jazz Museum

Kansas City, Mo: The Blue Room, one of the Down Beat Magazine’s top ranked jazz clubs, has another week of great performances lined up. The Blue Monday Jam on the 30th featuring TJ Martley closes out July. Martley is a jazz pianist who is considered one of the best young pianists in Kansas City. Bring your instrument and help send July out with a bang. Thursday August 2nd will feature Langston and The Prototype. Lee Langston is the lead singer ...

75

Radio

James Zollar - #40 at JazzWeek National Jazz Radio Chart

James Zollar - #40 at JazzWeek National Jazz Radio Chart

Source: Kari-On Productions

James Zollar debuts at #40 today on the national jazz radio chart Jazzweek. Zollar is enjoying success on the Jazzweek, CMJ and RMR national jazz radio charts with his new release Zollar Systems. The Zollar Systems CD contains a wide range of music for the musical palate, from swing, bebop and funk to avant-garde to bossa novas to sweet ballads. Add in soaring vocals on select tracks in different languages, it even has a bit of opera. Truly showcasing the ...

158

Radio

James Zollar Debuts at #17 on the CMJ National Jazz Radio Chart

James Zollar Debuts at #17 on the CMJ National Jazz Radio Chart

Source: Kari-On Productions

After a twelve year recording hiatus as a leader, Zollar re-emerges with Zollar Systems, a refreshingly sharp hard bop recital, bristling with energy and sonic acuteness. Tired of that old Blue Note '50s-'60s blowing session model? Think again. Zollar breathes new life into the old form, tightening it up and repackaging it for the 21st Century. This is apparent, right out of the chute with Daniel Jackson's “Chicago Preferred," in classic hard bop form: complex, rhythmically assertive head followed by ...

Primary Instrument

Trumpet

Willing to teach

Advanced only

Photos

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Night City

Brooklyn Jazz Underground Records
2024

buy

Swingin' Uptown

Self Produced
2024

buy

A Decade

Bandstand Presents
2024

buy

Holidays

Sunnyside Records
2023

buy

The Jam!

Self Produced
2022

buy

The Ways In

JZAZ Records
2022

buy

Similar

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.