The Boston Festival of New Jewish Music
Edmar and Tutti
The Boston Festival of New Jewish Music is a free monthly concert series presenting original music drawing from the Jewish cultural experience and highlights the best in Jewish-influenced music by composers and performers who live right here in our own backyard.
Season 1. Concert 6. Edmar and Tutti
Edmar Colón is a saxophonist, pianist and composer from Coamo, Puerto Rico, currently living in Boston.
Colón was awarded the prestigious Presidential Scholarship and graduated from the Berklee College of Music with a dual major in Performance and Classical Composition. As part of his undergraduate studies, Edmar was a student at the Berklee Global Jazz Institute directed by Danilo Pérez and Marco Pignataro. He went on to complete his Master’s degree in Global Studies at the Berklee Global Jazz Institute.
Edmar has toured and played in venues and events such as the Detroit Jazz Festival, Puerto Rico Heineken Jazz Festival, Toronto Jazz Festival, Panama Jazz Festival, Montreal Jazz Festival, and Monterrey Jazz Festival, among others. He recently played in the Kennedy Center for the Arts Mary Lou Williams Jazz Festival, Abbey Lincoln tribute tour with Grammy-award recipients Terri Lyne Carrington, Esperanza Spalding, Dianne Reeves and Dee Dee Bridgewater. Colón has performed with artists such as Joe Lovano, John Patitucci, Danilo Pérez, Danny Rivera, Hal Crook, Kenny Werner, Lionel Louke, John Michel Pilc, Patti Austin, Ledisi, Judith Hill, David Sanchez, Arturo Sandoval, George Garzone, Luis Enrique and Ivan Lins, among other notable artists of various musical genres.
In 2016, Colón was awarded the Latino 30 Under 30 Award New England from the El Mundo newspaper. He was also awarded first prize at the “Keep An Eye” International Jazz Awards in Amsterdam as a part of the Berklee Global Jazz Institute. In 2017, he was honored in the annual Patron Saint festivities of his hometown of Coamo, Puerto Rico.
As a writer in the last two years Edmar has worked with some of the biggest names in Jazz. In 2018 Colón was the copyist for Wayne Shorter’s newest orchestral work, an opera. During the same year Edmar was commissioned to write a 30 minute long orchestral piece for the Detroit Jazz Festival Symphony Orchestra. Also in 2018, he wrote the orchestrations for the piece “12 Little Spells” of Esperanza Spalding’s most recent album by the same name. On December of that year, Edmar worked as copyist/arranger for the Kennedy Center Honors award ceremony honoring Wayne Shorter. In addition, the young saxophonist worked as the arranger/orchestrator for Terri Lyne Carrington’s upcoming album.
Today, Edmar Colón is working on an orchestral commission by the National Symphony Orchestra for a number of concerts celebrating the centenary of Nat King Cole, as well as working on original material with a new working band for his debut album as Saxophonist and Composer.
Tutti Druyan began her career at the early age of 3. The singer and actress started out by dubbing some of the most successful cartoons in Israel, her native land. Dragon Tales, Rolie Polie Olie, the Barbie direct-to-DVD Movie Series, and The Smurfs, which Druyan also directed, are just a few of Tutti’s voice-over successes. At the age of 10, Tutti was casted as the lead role in one of Israel’s most successful yearly shows, Festigal, and toured in stadiums all over the country.
By the age of 12, Druyan took part in a play of one of the nation’s most respected theaters, Tzavta, and co-hosted a Children’s News TV show. In 2012, Druyan dubbed and directed the American English version of the film, Miffy the Movie, which was released in theaters around the world. During that same time four holiday albums Tutti sang in as a child were certified Platinum. In 2014, Druyan was selected alongside a small group of musicians, to debut a composition by Irish native, and legendary Riverdance Composer, Bill Whelan. In that same year, Tutti performed alongside Spanish superstar, Alejandro Sanz, in the Latin Grammy Awards.
From her arrival to the United States in 2010, Tutti appeared in several productions by composer Matti Kovler, including the lead roles in “Ami and Tami,” “Children’s Songs,” “A Tribute to Israeli Song,” and “The Seekers of Light,” which were presented in prestigious locations such as the Museum of Fine Arts and the Fenway Center in Boston. In addition, the 25 year old sang the Israeli and American National Anthems in different events and locations such as the Annual Dinner of the Friends of the IDF in New England, Logan International Airport, The Boston Lobsters Tennis Center, The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston City Hall Plaza, and The Massachusetts State House.
In October 2015, Tutti completed a very successful Kickstarter campaign to help raise funds for her debut EP, Possibilities. A year later, Tutti released Possibilities, which includes four original tracks written by her. The debut single off the album, Call Me Baby, has been playing on radio in the United States, reaching the Mediabase Activator Chart as well as the Billboard Top 40 Indicator Chart.
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The Boston Festival of New Jewish Music
The Boston Festival of New Jewish Music is a free monthly concert series presenting original music drawing from the Jewish cultural experience. Hosted by BackRoom at The Boston Synagogue, co-presented by JArts, and live-streaming everywhere, the Boston Festival of New Jewish Music highlights the best in Jewish-influenced music by composers and performers who live right here in our own backyard.
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