Improv Exchange Podcast

Keyboardist, producer, composer and house musician for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert’s band, Corey Bernhard will release his sophomore solo full-length album exploring themes of faith, God, love, and loss, A Blessed Leap into Eternity via Birdbrain Records on January 24, 2025. The seven original songs on the album are a sprawling, experimental, folk jazz suite rooted in Bernhard’s love of jazz, hip-hop, improvisation, and indie rock and he worked closely with engineer Michael Cumming (Sun Ra Arkestra, Odean Pope, Lotus, Orion Sun) in the engineer’s Kensington studio, Treacle Mine. “Michael and I were constantly experimenting with different sonic textures and effects to enhance the songs and he is a big part of the sound of the project,” says the composer. “He was also very patient during the mix process as we mixed directly from the board to tape.” Each of the songs is infused with the composer’s love of musical collaboration as he recruited many of his musician friends in to help him fully realize the tracks and their soundscapes. The album features performances in addition to Bernhard on the keys, from saxophonist and woodwind player Yesseh Furaha-Ali (Snacktime), bassist Jon Smith (played and produced on Jazmine Sullivan’s Heaux Tales), and drummer Lenny Mobley (Lauryn Hill, Jazmine Sullivan, J Brown, YG Marley, Musiq Soulchild). “With my first solo project, Fool's Pirouette, I was inspired by a lot of musical circles I was a part of that were focused on hip-hop,” says Bernhard. “I had spent a lot of time making beats with my old band (Killiam Shakespeare) and recording at Jazzy Jeff's studio, and most of my friends and collaborators who came through my own studio in Germantown to record were rappers and R&B focused singers. I'm still really happy with how that project sounds and proud of the insane collection of artists and musicians that are part of it. These days making beats just doesn't inspire me the way it used to. I've been playing with musicians like Charlie Hall and getting more excited about indie rock and folk textures. At the same time, I'm surrounded by a band at The Late Show everyday where everyone is a virtuoso on their instrument. I'm listening to and practicing a lot of classical music.” “I wanted to explore all of that while recording this project. Lenny, Jon, Yesseh, and I have all been playing with each other in countless situations around Philly for the past 10 years,” he continues. “They are elite musicians who aren't afraid to experiment or head into uncharted territory musically. I had a few simple sketches of some tunes, but we recorded live as a band without rehearsing anything. Later we added some extra layers of instrumentation, but the meat of the project is the four of us being in the moment together. The way things came together despite not having a real plan or goal for the sound of the album definitely reinforced the concept of faith as a central theme of the project.”

Ben Makinen is an award-winning filmmaker, music producer, composer, and percussionist with over 40 years of experience in film, television, theater, and music production. A voting member of the Recording Academy (GRAMMYS), he is known for his compelling documentaries that explore the rich interplay between music and culture. Ben has produced two acclaimed music documentaries, JazzTown and Who Killed Jazz, while his latest film, Echoes of Tradition, which delves into the Native American influences on the birth of jazz, has secured national distribution with PBS for 2025. His works are self-distributed through his company, Bmakin Film, with JazzTown available on platforms like AppleTV, Amazon Prime, Google Play, Vudu, and Rocky Mountain PBS. Currently, Ben is in post-production on We Are Here: Women In Jazz, a documentary that addresses the challenges women face in male-dominated industries, featuring internationally acclaimed recording artists (The Manhattan Transfer, Veronica Swift, Ingrid Jensen, Erena Terakubo, Endea Owens…) His collaborative spirit has led him to work with 11x Grammy-nominated Native American musician R. Carlos Nakai, who served as both producer and cultural advisor for Echoes of Tradition. Beginning his professional journey as a drummer in 1980, Ben’s early influences include jazz legends Billy Wallace (pianist with Max Roach) and Joe Bonner (pianist with Pharoah Sanders). Since 1990, he has worked as a music producer and composer, and in 2001, he founded Bmakin Film, focusing on diverse projects, including music videos, experimental films, narrative works, and documentaries. Throughout his career, he has produced and performed on over 50 albums across genres, from jazz and blues to pop, rock, electronica, new age, and opera. Passionate about teaching and mentoring, Ben founded the International Modern Film Alliance (IMFA) in 2020 to promote storytelling through the integration of music and film. He leads workshops for children and young adults in Bali, Indonesia, sharing his love for jazz and cinema. Additionally, he is organizing Bali’s first AI International Film Festival, set to launch in 2025.

Koki Nakano is a composer and a pianist, born in 1988 in Fukuoka, Japan. After graduating Music High School at Toho Gakuen School of Music in Tokyo, he enrolled at the composition department of Tokyo University of the Arts. He has performed recitals at the Louvre and the Théâtre du Châtelet (Paris), Cadogan Hall (London), Lincoln Center (New York). He released his first album Lift in 2016, in collaboration with French cellist Vincent Segal under the Paris-based label Nø Førmat!. ​In 2019, Koki took part in a research workshop at the Reborn Art Festival in the landscapes of Ishinomaki‘s bay. Accompanied by renowned visual artist Kohei Nawa, famous choreographer Damien Jalet, and few dancers, they explore different points of fusion between the human body and the landscape. ​His second album Pre-choreographed is released in April 2020. Koki mixed his classical pieces with electronic sounds and he developed this relationship between dance and music. In 2021, Koki composed the original music for Damien Jalet’s piece ‘Brise-lames’ and performed it live at Palais Garnier for Paris Opera’s opening gala. His third album, Oceanic Feeling is released in 2022 as well as four musical videos gathering choreographers and dancers Tess Voelker and Nicolas Huchard, Marion Motin, Mourad Bouayad. ​Koki Nakano's new album Ululō is released in October 2024, in collaboration with singers Yaël Naim, Wayne Snow and Jordy.

Tigran Hamasyan is considered one of the most remarkable and distinctive jazz-meets-rock pianists/composers of his generation. A piano virtuoso with groove power, Hamasyan seamlessly fuses potent jazz improvisation and progressive rock with the rich folkloric music of his native Armenia. Born in Gyumri, Armenia, in 1987, his musical journey began in his childhood home, where he was exposed to a diverse array of musical influences leading to him playing piano at the age of three, performing in festivals and competitions by the time he was eleven, and winning the Montreux Jazz Festival’s piano competition in 2003. He released his debut album, World Passion, in 2004 at the age of seventeen. The following year, he won the prestigious Thelonious Monk International Jazz Piano Competition. Additional albums include New Era; Red Hail; A Fable, for which he was awarded a Victoires de la Musique (the equivalent of a Grammy Award in France); Shadow Theater; and Luys i Luso which featured the Yerevan State Chamber Choir focusing on Armenian sacred music stretching stylistically from the 5th century to the 20th century.   His Nonesuch debut, Mockroot (2015), won the Echo Jazz Award for International Piano Instrumentalist of the Year; subsequent records for the label include An Ancient Observer (2017) the companion EP, For Gymuri (2018), Revisiting the Film (2021) and most recently StandArt (2022). Hamasyan was awarded the Deutscher Jazzpreis international category in Piano/Keyboards in 2021. Hamasyan has released records on France’s Plus Loins, Universal France, Nonesuch and ECM. Hamasyan’s new conceptual album “The Bird of a Thousand Voices” was released in August 2024 on Naïve/Believe – his debut with the label. Tigran composed, scored, and arranged the much-anticipated project blending its traditional folk footprints with rock influences. The first single from the album “The Kingdom” can also be experienced as an interactive game at www.bird1000.com. The recently released double album is inspired by an ancient Armenian tale in which a hero travels into unseen realms to find and bring back a mythical bird – whose thousand different songs will awaken people again and bring harmony to the world. The transmedia music theater piece ‘The Bird of a Thousand Voices’, an intriguing immersive light installation with shadow play, digitally programmed voices, live music, and an Armenian-English libretto, premiered at the Holland Festival in June 2024.   In addition to awards and critical acclaim, Hamasyan has built a dedicated following worldwide, as well as praise from Herbie Hancock, Brad Mehldau and the late Chick Corea. “With startling combinations of jazz, minimalist, electronic, folk and songwriterly elements…Hamasyan and his collaborators travel musical expanses marked with heavy grooves, ethereal voices, pristine piano playing and ancient melodies. You’ll hear nothing else like this” (NPR)