2025-2026 Season: Zaccai Curtis Cubop Quintet
January 17, 2026 @ 7:30 pm
Zaccai Curtis is a pianist, composer, and producer known for fusing the essential elements of Latin jazz and bebop languages. Most recently, his album Cubop Lives!, released under his own, collective label (Truth Revolution), won the 2025 Grammy Award for Best Latin Jazz Album. This concert will feature the actual musicians who recorded with Zaccai on his Grammy-winning release.
A three-time ASCAP Young Jazz Composer Award recipient, Zaccai Curtis has also been honored with the Connecticut Artist Fellowship, Chamber Music America’s New Jazz Works grant (2017), and toured with the U.S. State Department’s Jazz Ambassadors program. In 2020, he was named a Rising Star in the DownBeat Critics Poll. As co-founder of the artist-run label TRRcollective, he has produced Grammy-nominated work, including Entre Colegas by the legendary Latin bassist, Andy González.
Curtis has performed with a wide range of artists, including Chief Adjuah (formerly Christian Scott), Donald Harrison, Santana, Cindy Blackman, Eddie Palmieri, Brian Lynch, the Mambo Legends, and Avery Sharpe. A dedicated educator, Curtis teaches at the University of Hartford and Western Connecticut State University, and is the author of two instructional books on jazz theory and Latin rhythms.
For the VJC’s event, Curtis’ quintet will expand upon the Cubop era of the late 40s, exploring and reimagining Afro-Cuban jazz concepts. Their repertoire is a mix of new compositions and classics from Dizzy Gillespie and Kenny Dorham to Machito and Mario Bauzá.
—Downbeat Magazine
