Photo by Tasha Miller

The Ben Darwish Group consists of Tim Willcox on sax, Bill Athens on bass, Randy Rollofson on drums, and Ben Darwish on piano and vocals.  Melody and groove is the nucleus of this band and they expand on these core elements using concept and improvisation.  Although they’re widely considered as “jazz”, their music is very accessible; appealing to a wide range of listeners.

As individual musicians, members of the Ben Darwish Group have received many awards and honors including: several Downbeat awards, Presidential Scholar in the Arts, The Betty Carter Jazz Ahead Workshop, and The Stan Getz/ Cliffford Brown Fellowship.  Darwish was nominated for  “Album of the Year” at the 2010 Portland Music Awards, and most recently, won the 2010 ASCAP Young Jazz Composer Award.  The Ben Darwish Group has performed at premier jazz clubs in the Northwest and plan to release an EP in Summer of 2010.  

The Ben Darwish Group was recently invited to audition at Jazz At Lincoln Center for the Rhythm Road: American Music Abroad program.  Although they weren’t chosen as finalists, Darwish used this experience to develop an educational presentation on the history of Jazz which he will be presenting in several schools in the Portland area.

Here’s a live review of the Ben Darwish Group at Jimmy Maks:

“As the songs went on, you noticed a few things. The first was that Ben is extremely talented, and technically seems to lack for nothing. This quickly revealed itself once the numbers started getting a bit hotter and Ben started to take solos. Departing from the comping that allows room for other musicians to move, Ben’s hand flew over that grand piano in a way that would have made Art Tatum proud. The notes were on, he wasn’t greedy with his time, and the compositions showed a lot of skill. The second thing you noticed was that he wasn’t the only flare in the gun. Tim Willcox could play a mean sax, Randy Rollofson effortlessly dipped in and out of splashy and powerfully syncopated stick hits and Athens… knew how to add key flourishes from any point of his instrument. The team was there…”

-Colin McLaughlin/ Melophobe.com