Julian Waterfall Pollack

At the mere age of eighteen, Julian Waterfall Pollack has the jazz community abuzz with his remarkably mature, technically ferocious, and dynamically original piano playing. A classically trained pianist, Pollack has unleashed into the world a singular blend of music that combines his love for today’s popular music styles and a respect for the classical tradition — with a forward-looking, innovative virtuosity well beyond his young years. Pollack will be featured on Marian McPartland’s renowned NPR show, Piano Jazz, on June 26th, 2007. The show will be aired nationwide. On his aptly-titled debut recording, Goin’ For It (Jazzschool Records, 2006), Pollack does just that. Writes San Jose Mercury News critic Andrew Gilbert: “Pollack may have started Goin’ For It as a student, but with the completion of his first album, he has earned the right to teach some lessons of his own.” The opening tracks “Take Me Outside” and “Valeria” may well be a contrast in style, but they are more clearly an indication of the astounding range of Pollack’s musical and compositional talent. His innovative approaches in re-imagining the jazz standard repertory include a new melodic and rhythmic structure in the pop music idiom of Miles Davis’ “Four,” and a jaw-dropping, re-harmonization with a hip-hop backbeat of John Coltrane’s famously complex “Giant Steps.” After the release of Goin’ For It, JAZZIZ Magazine selected the high-octane original, "Take Me Outside," to be on its monthly CD series, JAZZIZ On Disc (October 2006). Pollack has performed with the likes of Joshua Redman, Nicholas Payton, Miguel Zenon, Eric Harland, and Andre Hayward, and at prestigious venues such as Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola, Lincoln Center, and Yoshi’s, and international festivals including Montreux, Umbria, and Monterey. Pollack is also the recipient of numerous prestigious national awards, such as the National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts (NFAA) Level One Gold Prize and member of its Clifford Brown/Stan Getz All-Stars, Down Beat’s Student Music Award for “Outstanding High School Jazz Instrumental Group” (2004, 2005), as well as 1st Place, Combo Division in consecutive years (2005, 2006) and “Outstanding Combo Soloist” three years running (2004, 2005, 2006) at Monterey Jazz Festival’s Next Generation Festival. He served as the principal pianist for the San Francisco Bay Area's preeminent honors youth ensemble, the SFJAZZ All-Star High School Ensemble, for his four high school years, making him the very first “full-scholarship” student of the program. In addition to his astounding ability in jazz, Pollack’s self-released album Alive Again showcases his compositional diversity in the pop and rock genres, on which he plays guitar, bass, drums, and performs vocals. Quotes: “I want to be the first to say it: Julian is a genius.”
 —Albert "Tootie" Heath, jazz legend “...a tremendously gifted player whose debut CD, Goin' For It, is the work of an artist advanced far beyond his 18 years.”
 —Contra Costa Times “[Pollack's] been turning heads for a while now, because his playing is loose, confident, rhythmically assured, and emotionally committed.”
 —San Jose Mercury News “...uncannily young and astonishingly talented...” 
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