Artistic Director

Trumpeter Riley Mulherkar is a founding member of The Westerlies, and in 2024 released his debut album Riley, hailed as “one of the best debut records to come out in a long, long time” (DownBeat). The trumpeter has had audiences on their feet since he was in middle school, as a prodigious and disciplined player soaking up everything he could from Seattle's unexpectedly rich and rooted jazz community. Playing under legendary band directors Robert Knatt and Clarence Acox prepared him for Juilliard, where he quickly found a musical home with Jazz at Lincoln Center and its leader, Wynton Marsalis. Since, he has played with everyone from Kenny Barron and Dee Dee Bridgewater to Anna Deavere Smith and Alan Cumming, and in 2020 received Lincoln Center’s prestigious Emerging Artist Award for his work as “an original bandleader, composer, arranger, educator, community activist and advocate for jazz and the arts.” 

Leading countless jazz ensembles as "the sort of musician who sees improvised music as a perfect delivery system for joy," as writer Nate Chinen put it, Mulherkar also stretched outside the genre alongside The Westerlies, a new music brass quartet that creates the rarest of hybrids: music that is both “folk-like and composerly, lovely and intellectually rigorous” (NPR Music), with performances from Carnegie Hall to Coachella.

Riley, his opening recorded salvo as a soloist, is the sonically modern setting for Mulherkar’s vulnerable, melodious interpretation of this rich tradition with sound design shaped by producers Rafiq Bhatia and Chris Pattishall. Enveloping Mulherkar within a series of textured, intricately-crafted spaces, Bhatia and Pattishall train a cinematographer’s lens on the continuum of great old songs, as well as new Mulherkar pieces which fit right in. Described as “über hip, modern yet timeless” (DownBeat), it’s a radically bold audio framework for the emotional pronouncements of Riley’s horn.

Riley is an Edwards Artist and performs on Edwards trumpets.

www.rileymulherkar.com

About the Joye in Aiken Artists

In addition to a thriving performance career as a mainstay pianist both in New York jazz clubs and in concert halls with today’s leading Broadway stars, Addison Frei’s compositions span more than a dozen albums and continue to receive acclaim from audiences worldwide. Highlighted by inventive pianism and dynamic melodies, Frei demonstrates a fluidity in writing for instrumental ensembles and favorite vocal collaborators alike. Frei’s most recent trio recordings Coin Flip (2024) and Time and Again (2022) enjoyed several months on the JazzWeek radio charts. His chamber work for string quartet and piano trio “Comment On War” was awarded the David Baker Bridges Prize and premiered at the Ravinia Festival.

A proud Yamaha Artist, Frei tours regularly with Broadway stars Renée Elise Goldsberry and Joshua Henry, including dates at the Hollywood Bowl and Kennedy Center. Other solo performance highlights include the Monterey Jazz Festival, Montreux Jazz Festival, DC Jazz Festival and Lucerne Piano Festival. Frei is a graduate of the Juilliard School’s Artist Diploma program and served as musical director for this flagship ensemble’s stint at Jazz at Lincoln Center Shanghai. As a side-person Frei has recorded more than 30 albums. He has earned first prize in several competitions including the UNISA Jazz Piano Competition in Pretoria, ZA, the American Jazz Pianist Competition and the Montreux Jazz Piano Competition.

www.addisonfrei.com

About the Joye in Aiken Artists

New York City-based acoustic/electric bassist and composer Barry Stephenson has been acclaimed as “one of the most sought-after bassists on the scene today.” Released in 2020, Barry’s The Iconoclast was nominated for the NAACP Image Award® for Outstanding Jazz Album (Instrumental), and was notably the only independently-produced album in a category that included work by Jon Batiste, George Burton, Christian Sands, and Immanuel Wilkins. The Iconoclast was also named by Offbeat magazine as one of the Top 50 Albums of 2020. 

www.barrystephensonmusic.com

About the Joye in Aiken Artists

Jade Elliott is a talented and versatile music artist currently based in Brooklyn, New York. Her musical journey began at a young age, as she started studying piano at five years old.  She later added woodwinds like the saxophone, flute, and clarinet to her world as she developed a deep passion for jazz and improvisation. Inspired by her father’s work as a film composer and freelance jazz musician and her mother’s career in healthcare as a critical care nurse, Jade always strived to unite the fields of music and medicine. She completed her master's degree in music therapy at New York University to bring mental health resources and advocacy to socially disadvantaged minority groups, knowing how influential music has been to her own wellness. Now, Jade is finding balance as a musician, educator, and licensed creative arts therapist in New York. 

About the Joye in Aiken Artists

John Sturino is an award-winning composer, drummer, bandleader, and educator based in New York City.  Sturino is the founder and bandleader of the New York-based ensemble BLOW GLOBE, a ten-person chamber ensemble that captures the breadth of an entire wind orchestra into tight ten-person unit.  Sturino and BLOW GLOBE were the recipients of the Chamber Music America New Jazz Works Commission Grant in 2024.

As a composer, Sturino was awarded the David Baker Prize from the Ravinia Steans Institute for his work ‘A Boundless Design’ (2025), which fuses both jazz quartet and classical string quartet together for a truly unique and refined sound.

A graduate of The Juilliard School, Sturino maintains an active career performing and recording as a drummer both internationally and domestically. Sturino is a regular with The Jazz Gallery Composers Showcase big band, and continues a working relationship with artists such as Robert Edwards, Jihye Lee Jazz Orchestra, and Miho Hazama’s ‘m_unit’ Ensemble. Sturino also records remote drum and percussion tracks for clients all over the world from his Brooklyn-based studio.

Sturino is a Yamaha Drumset Artist, Prologix Artist, and Zildjian & Vic Firth Educational Artist.

johnsturino.com

About the Joye in Aiken Artists