(RAHWAY, NJ) -- Saturday, June 6, 2026 marks the date when Jazz Royalty comes to Hamilton Stage with Dizzy Gillespie alumni and Grammy winning bassist John Lee in collaboration with 16-time Grammy winner Paquito D' Rivera.
These two giants of jazz will be backed by the world famous and world-traveled Dizzy Gillespie All Stars featuring one of the most sought-after trumpeters around, Freddie Hendrix. Expect some Dizzy Gillespie classics and some foot stomping rhythms as Paquito shows off his prowess on clarinet and saxophone from the Dizzy Gillespie Afro-Latin period.
Come early to the WBGO Piano lounge, have a cocktail on the couch and hear the incredible Leonieke Scheuble perform her tribute to Dizzy on the Fazoli Grand Piano. Her performances are at 4:00pm & 7:00pm.
Adding to the Hamilton Experience will be Essex County College presenting an art exhibition by artist Dino Commodore Gravato.
Tickets range from $67-$77 and are available at www.smoothjazznj.com. Free onsite parking is available. Hamilton Stage is located at 360 Hamilton Street in Rahway, New Jersey.
The Dizzy Gillespie All Stars perform the music of the 40s and 50s as an ensemble of 6-8, including tunes such as “A Night In Tunisia,” “Anthropology,” “BeBop,” “Birks Works,” “Blue ‘N’ Boogie,” “Con Alma,” “Dizzy Atmosphere,” “Groovin’ High,” “Hot House,” “Oop-Pop-Sh’-Bam,” “Ow,” “Salt Peanuts,” and many more.
The line-up, which varies, includes some of the stellar musicians who used to work with Gillespie, plus some of the best and brightest young up-and-comers of the next generation of jazz.
From 1984 thru 1993, John Lee was Dizzy Gillespie’s bassist, performing and recording in the trumpet master’s various bands including the Dizzy Gillespie Quintet, Dizzy Gillespie Big Band, and Dizzy’s GRAMMY award winning United Nation Orchestra.
After Gillespie’s passing, his family asked John to create an ongoing tribute to the great man and his music, and the concept for the Dizzy Gillespie All-Stars was born.
Lee is the bassist and director of the Dizzy Gillespie All-Stars, Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Big Band, and the Dizzy Gillespie Afro-Latin Experience.
Lee has worked in the bands of Gary Bartz, Larry Coryell, Jon Faddis, Aretha Franklin, Roberta Gambarini, Roy Hargrove, Jimmy Heath, Gregory Hines, Miriam Makeba, James Moody, Claudio Roditi, Sonny Rollins, and McCoy Tyner. Beyond bass, Lee is also a GRAMMY award winning record producer and audio engineer who has produced over 100 recordings and is the co-founder of the record label JLP, Jazz Legacy Productions.
Saxophonist, clarinetist, composer and writer Paquito D’ Rivera, winner of 16 awards between GRAMMYs and Latin GRAMMYs, has received numerous recognitions for his relevance in Latin Jazz and as a composer of classical music. Born in Marianao, Havana, Cuba, El Paq-Man, as he is known among his many friends, colleagues, and fans, is passionate about both jazz and classical music, Brazilian music, rumba, tangos, and more. One of the main objectives of his work is to make them all an integral whole.
He was awarded the NEA Jazz Masters Award in 2005 and the National Medal of the Arts (2005), as well as the Kennedy Center’s Living Jazz Legend Award (2007). Among his recognitions are the Honoris Causa doctorate from the Berklee School in Boston, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Clarinetist of the Year award from the Jazz Journalist Association (2004 and 2006). In 2008, he received the award from the Association for Jazz Education Present and the Frankfurter Musikpreis (Germany).
In 2010, he was named Nelson A Rockefeller Honoree and given the Spelman College African American Classical Music Award. In 2011, he received his eleventh GRAMMY award for ‘Panamericana Suite’ for Best Latin Album and Best Contemporary Classical Composition, adding it to his previous GRAMMY awards for ‘Riberas’ (Best Classical Recording 2005) and ‘Funk Tango’ (Best Music Album) Latin Jazz 2008). His “Concerto Venezolano” for Symphony Orchestra, written for trumpet extraordinaire Soloist Pacho Flores, was awarded Best Contemporary Classical composition in 2023.
D’Rivera is the first artist to win Latin Grammys in the classical music and Latin jazz categories, for ‘Historia del Soldado’ (L’Histoire du Soldat), ‘Stravinsky’ (2003) and ‘Brazilian Dreams’ (2002) with The New York Voices.
He has been artistic director of the jazz program of the New Jersey Chamber Music Society, the Jazz Patagonia of Chile, and from 1996 to date has served as musical director of the prestigious International Jazz Festival of Punta del Este, Uruguay, presenting luminaries of the genre such as Benny Golson, McCoy Tyner, Michael Brecker, Toots Thielemans, Jon Faddis, Lenny Andrade, Kenny Burrell and many more artists.
In 1999, the University of Alcalá de Henares, in celebration of its 500 years of history, presented D’Rivera with a special award that recognizes his contribution to the arts, his human qualities and his defense of the rights and freedoms of artists around the world. The National Endowment for the Arts on its website highlights that Paquito “has become an accomplished multinational ambassador, creating and promoting a musical interculturality that moves effortlessly between jazz, Latin music and Mozart.”
