The Embassy is pleased to support the 2018 Sopot Jazz Festival, one of the oldest jazz festivals in Poland, that runs from October 4-6. Two renowned American saxophonists, Roxy Coss and Lauren Sevian, will perform at the festival. Musician, composer, bandleader, educator and activist Roxy Coss has performed extensively around the world, including headlining at the Newport Jazz Festival, Melbourne Big Band Festival, Earshot Jazz Festival, San Jose Jazz Summerfest, and many others. Winner of a 2016 ASCAP Young Jazz Composer Award, the Downbeat Critics’ Poll listed her as a “Rising Star” on Soprano Saxophone the past five years. In March 2018 she released her fourth album, The Future Is Female receiving 4.5-Star reviews from Downbeat and All About Jazz magazines. Roxy Coss is also the founder of Women In Jazz Organization (http://wearewijo.org/), a collective of over 300 professional jazz musicians, who identify as women or gender non-binary, working to level the playing field in jazz, leading to an improved and more rich, diverse and successful art form. Ms. Coss will talk about the organization in Sopot and offer a masterclass in Warsaw (October 8 from 10:00 – 16:00 at the Music University of Warsaw) and on October 9 at Krakow Music Academy.
Lauren Sevian is a Grammy award-winning baritone saxophonist who attended the Manhattan School of Music and soon thereafter began touring with groups such as Diva and the Artie Shaw Orchestra. She performs as a bandleader in New York City with her quartet, the LSQ, or LSAT. Her quintet co-led with alto saxophonist Alexa Tarantino recently won first place in the “Made in NY” jazz competition. She can be heard regularly with the Mingus Big Band, and has performed with countless other groups, notably the Dizzy Gillespie all-star big band, Christian McBride’s Big Band, Robin Eubanks Big Band, and the legendary Count Basie Orchestra.
