New Rochelle’s own Joe Giglio came back home, with his trio, to perform for an audience of sixty on Saturday, April 14, at the New Rochelle Public Library’s concert hall. Giglio and his band-mates, Michael Goetz on bass and Bob Meyer on drums, played two sets of jazz standards. “It’s nice to return to my hometown,” Giglio said. Giglio, a member of the Jazz faculty at the Westchester Conservatory of Music, has led his own trio for many years. Educated at both SUNY College at New Paltz and SUNY College at Purchase, Giglio has performed with jazz legends such as Houston Person, Howard Alden, Bucky Pizzarelli, and Ralph LaLama. He has performed throughout the tri-state area at numerous clubs including “The 55 Bar”, “Mikell’s”, “The Bitter End”, “Windows on the World”, and performs every Friday at New York City nightspot - “107 West” on Manhattan’s “Upper Westside”. Giglio’s debut CD, “Inside Out”, was characterized by “20th Century Guitar Magazine” as “ the work an artist whose time is now.” An accomplished guitar player with an assured sound, Giglio has added singing to his musical arsenal. On Saturday, he treated the audience to two vocal performances. Singing is natural to Giglio because he grew up listening to jazz immortals like Billie Holiday, Tony Bennett, Sarah Vaughn, and Nat King Cole. “I was always able to sing. I learned to sing these kinds of songs just by listening”, Giglio said. For Giglio, his singing and guitar playing are linked. “I hope that someday I can play as naturally as I sing. My goal is for my guitar playing to be that natural. Great players have a lot of vocal quality in their music. If it is something that you can’t sing, it is probably too technical to play. In other words it may be more about the notes than the feeling,” Giglio said. Giglio keeps a distance from the debates about what defines good music and just keeps working in an art form that people have been calling dead for ages. “People have been saying jazz is dead since it was born. As long as there are people, there will be jazz. Anyone who is really playing his or her self is worth listening to”, Giglio said.
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