2026 Solo Jazz Piano Festival

Saturday Events:

Welcome to DAY TWO of the Vermont Jazz Center’s tenth annual Solo Jazz Piano Festival.

This festival illustrates the wide variety of jazz piano styles and approaches by calling on the pianists themselves to convey their own unique attributes while simultaneously demonstrating their direct link to the music’s lineage.

It’s revealing to compare the differences and similarities amongst pianists’ stylistic tendencies. As a group, all the pianists demonstrate a veneration for the instrument, an embrace of the jazz tradition, and a need to create a personal statement. But they all have chosen different pathways that reflect their own life experiences.

A Weekend of Concerts and Masterclasses
The capstone of the festival is evening performances by our four headliners on Friday and Saturday. You heard Mathis Picard and Lawrence Field’s performance last night, but today’s daytime, education-oriented offerings are especially important attributes of the festival’s programming. Each of the four headlining musicians will offer masterclasses that are designed for the public. These masterclasses reveal the way that each musician thinks about music and life. Today will also feature sets by the two emerging artists, and a round-table discussion with all six musicians.

Headliner Bios:

MATHIS PICARD: Originally from France and Madagascar, pianist Mathis Picard finds his voice by merging his many musical and cultural backgrounds. His musical education began at the Pittsburgh Suzuki Academy and continued at the Conservatoire de Fontainebleau, the Centre de Musique de Didier Lockwood, and Chetham’s School of Music. At the age of 10, Picard was the youngest finalist in the history of the Montreux Jazz Piano Competition. Back in the States, he received his degree from the Juilliard School under the mentorship of Kenny Barron. As a performer Picard has toured the world and in 2022 served as the Umbria Jazz Festival’s Resident Artist. He is an ASCAP Next Generation of Songwriters recipient, a member of the Montreux Jazz Foundation and appeared on NPR Live performing his fugue “Mysticism Of Money in D Minor.”

Picard has released several albums as a leader including two solo recordings. He also runs The Sound Orchestra, a large-scale ensemble which performs his original works. Picard was praised by DownBeat for his “brilliant classical technique and a vivid imagination.” Picard has recorded or shared the stage with Ron Carter, Lillias White, Lee Ritenour, Kindness, Wynton Marsalis, Veronica Swift, Etienne Charles, Christian McBride, Joel Ross, Melanie Charles, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Bria Skonberg, and many others. He performed on the Jazz Center’s stage in May of 2025 with Endea Owens.

LAWRENCE FIELDS: Fields is one of the more melodic players of his generation – his playing brings to mind a combination of the aesthetics of Keith Jarrett and Robert Glasper. His thoughtful improvisations and exquisite harmonic choices have earned him accolades and positions in the groups of forward-thinking leaders such as Joe Lovano, Dave Douglas, Chief Adjuah, Nicholas Payton, Branford Marsalis, Terri Lyne Carrington, Jeff “Tain” Watts and many others. Originally from St. Louis, Fields left his job as a computer programmer to dedicate himself to music. He attended Berklee College of Music as a James Williams Scholar. His 2024 Album, To the Surface with bassist Yasushi Nakamura and Corey Fonville earned him 4 stars and Rising Star recognition in Downbeat. Joe Lovano said: “I love playing music with Lawrence Fields. He’s full of ideas, plays with a beautiful sound and feeling and can swing! He’s always inspired – and that’s where the magic is…”

CAMILA CORTINA: Camila Cortina Bello is a Cuban-born pianist, composer, and educator whose music bridges ancestral memory and contemporary expression. Drawing from Afro-Cuban rhythms, jazz improvisation, and classical form, she crafts soundscapes that speak to identity, resilience, and transformation. She currently works as an active performer in New York’s jazz scene. Cortina has received numerous awards – she is a Chamber Music America New Jazz Works Grantee and served as a New Music USA Next Jazz Legacy Fellow. Cortina has earned several recognitions from Berklee School of Music including the Master’s Student of the Year and the Duke Ellington Award. At Berklee she was mentored by Terri Lyne Carrington and received full scholarships to attend both their Global Jazz and Jazz and Gender Justice Institutes.

Camila has performed in high-profile stages across the Americas including the DC Jazz Festival, Cape May Jazz Festival, Ecuador Jazz Festival, and Punta del Este Jazz Festival. She has collaborated with Paquito D’Rivera, Dianne Reeves, and Miguel Zenón. Her solo piano work Bravura premiered at London’s Barbican Centre (2024), and she appears on NPR’s Tiny Desk with the Cuban group Okan. Saxophonist Paquito D’Rivera has remarked about Cortina: “If it’s all about musicality, good taste, versatility, passion, professionalism, stage presence and good vibes, it seems like we’re talking about the exquisite pianist Camila Cortina.”

GEOFFREY KEEZER: Geoffrey Keezer is a Grammy-winning pianist, composer, arranger and producer based in the New York City region. After briefly attending the Berklee College of Music in Boston, Keezer moved to New York City at the age of 19. Soon after his arrival, Art Blakey asked Keezer to join the Jazz Messengers, he was a member of that legendary group until Blakey’s passing in 1990. Keezer has toured and recorded with Ray Brown, Roy Hargrove, Joshua Redman, Diana Krall, Art Farmer, Benny Golson, Barbara Hendricks, Wayne Shorter, Dianne Reeves, David Sanborn, Chris Botti, Sting, Joe Locke and Christian McBride. He has released over 20 albums as a leader and performs on dozens of recordings as a sideman. He is also an educator who teaches at Juilliard School. Keezer won a Grammy for the composition “Refuge” on his album Playdate. His 2009 recording Áurea was nominated for a Best Latin Jazz Album Grammy.

Keezer has also produced and arranged three Grammy-nominated recordings with vocalist Denise Donatelli and released a series of collaborative albums drawing influences from Hawaiian, Okinawan and Afro-Peruvian folk traditions. Keezer’s compositions have been commissioned by the Mainly Mozart Festival, Art of Elán ensemble, Saint Joseph Ballet, Zeltsman Marimba Festival, Carnegie Hall Jazz Orchestra and Scottish National Jazz Orchestra. His music can be heard in the films What Happens in Vegas, The Wedding Year, and Inhale, and in numerous TV shows including The Young and the Restless, Parks and Recreation, Casual, House of Lies, Call Me Kat, American Crime Story, Clarice, and The Originals. Keezer has had the opportunity to perform and tour with Sting, who said “In the universe of piano players that I have been exposed to over the years, Geoffrey has proved himself to be not only a superb technician and improviser, but also above and beyond this, a composer and conceptualist who can maintain the overall line and the DNA of the song in everything he plays. A musician’s musician.”