Artistic Genius ELEW Live Performance Set for Jan 28

On Sunday, Jan. 28, Performance Music at The University of Scranton will kick off their spring concert season with a performance by ELEW, master of the piano and creator of “Rockjazz” and “Counterbop.” The concert begins at 7:30 p.m. in the Houlihan-McLean Center, Mulberry Street and Jefferson Avenue. Admission is free and the concert is open to the public, with seating on a first-come, first-seated basis.

“I am very much looking forward to offering our students and audiences the opportunity to hear this creative genius in a live concert setting – few artists spin my head with their virtuosity and creativity as consistently as ELEW,” said Cheryl Y. Boga, conductor and director of Performance Music.

A native of Camden, New Jersey, Eric Lewis began his musical studies at 2 years old and received the Rodgers and Hammerstein full merit scholarship to the Manhattan School of Music. Upon graduation, he toured the world, recorded, and performed with Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, Elvin Jones, Cassandra Wilson, Roy Hargrove and John Hendricks, among others. In 1999, he won the Thelonious Monk International Piano Competition, at the time the most coveted prize in jazz.

A decade into his career, Lewis reemerged as ELEW and began fusing his piano techniques with rock guitar-based ideas and experimental prepared piano methods, generating a powerful crossover brand he coined “Rockjazz.” Over the course of multiple award-winning, critically-acclaimed albums, ELEW has re-imagined songs by The Killers, Nirvana, Coldplay and Michael Jackson to name a few. Throughout his career he has built an elite fanbase of distinguished leaders and celebrities including Leonardo DiCaprio, Gerard Butler, Barack and Michele Obama, Prince Albert II, Will Smith, Eli Roth, Al Pacino and many others.

Inspired by the European masters of Baroque counterpoint, ELEW has innovated the technique of simultaneously executing two independent melodies which precisely detail harmonic forms bursting with idiomatic verisimilitude and wide-ranging historical references, all while flawlessly maintaining the idiosyncratic Afrocentric timing at the core of jazz improvisation. He has named this technique “Counterbop.” His album Cubism - ELEW plays Rosenwinkel, a solo piano exploration of contemporary jazz legend Kurt Rosenwinkel, provides perspective an insight into the nature of what Counterbop is and how it may be implemented.

In addition to performing on piano and appearing in and scoring for films, ELEW is a prominent international DJ. He has created disco infernos for multiple events such as The World Economic Forum, TED, Art Basel, A-list Oscar parties, the Monte-Carlo Gala, the Cannes Film Festival and multiple celebrity birthdays and weddings. This has led to him creating yet another innovation he calls “Piano Turntablism,” literally playing two different yet recognizable songs simultaneously as a DJ would, but on the piano.

For further information about the January performance, call 570-941-7624, email music@scranton.edu or visit the Performance Music website. For more info on ELEW, visit elewrockjazz.com.