Temple B’nai Israel, The Satell Center for Jewish Life on the Eastern Shore presents the Susan & Barry Koh 2022 Jazz Concert Series. The series will feature a variety of jazz styles that will be presented to the community at no charge on June 15, 22, and 29.

The series, that features exceptional talent from Baltimore, Washington DC, and Talbot County, is hosted by the Temple’s Rabbi Peter E. Hyman. Rabbi Hyman, a jazz afficionado, believes that “jazz is a truly original American art that is celebrated and enjoyed around the world.”

On June 15, The Fred Hughes Trio will present a program of music by some of the most influential jazz artists and composers. Pianist Fred Hughes, bassist Paul Langosch, and percussionist Keith Killgo, bring a level of music performance and experience that can only be obtained through years on the stage. The program includes tunes from Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, and Bill Evans with compositions from George Gershwin, Cole Porter, and Johnny Mandel.

The Trio delights in not only performing this great music, but presenting information and stories about the compositions and artists through their experience touring and recording with the likes of Tony Bennett, Joe Henderson, Rosemary Clooney, and Donald Byrd.

On Wednesday, June 22, Washington DC-based musician Paul Carr and his band perform, featuring vocal powerhouse Sharón Clark. Mr. Carr, a Houston native and Howard University graduate, has dedicated his professional career to performing and promoting Jazz through education and community outreach. He carries on the Texas tenor tradition espoused by great heroes such as Arnett Cobb and Don Wilkerson, who served as his early idols and mentors.

Washington DC jazz fans pack the house whenever singer Sharón Clark takes the stage. This prolific artist has assumed the mantle of Washington’s “Queen of Jazz.” Jazz Times calls her “a revelation…I never thought I’d hear a singer with the range, musicality and command of tone and timbre that was Sarah Vaughan at her best, but now I have.”

Ms. Clark has performed as a featured soloist with the Duke Ellington Orchestra, Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra, the Richmond Symphony, and the Baltimore Symphony. She performs regularly in New York at the Iridium and the Metropolitan Room and in DC at Blues Alley, the Kennedy Center, and Bethesda Blues and Jazz Club.

Sac au Lait closes the series on June 29, playing traditional New Orleans jazz and swing music from the 1920’s and 30’s with a modern attitude. Based in Baltimore, their music includes both vocal and instrumental tunes. Led by banjo player Frank Patinella, Sac Au Lait has been a highlight of the fun and lively Baltimore New Orleans jazz scene for over 18 years.

Sac au Lait includes the following musicians: Frank Donn on trumpet and vocals, Rich Howard on trombone and vocals, John Dierker on clarinet, Frank Patinella on banjo and vocals, Liz Prince on tuba, and David Polimene on drums.

Temple B’nai Israel’s Susan & Barry Koh Jazz 2022 Concert Series will begin at 7:00 PM on June 15, 22, and 29, with doors opening at 6:30. The Temple is located at 7199 Tristan Drive, right off the Easton bypass. All concerts are free and open to the public; no reservations required. Proof of full Covid vaccination is required and masks are highly encouraged. For further information, please call 410-822-0553.

Temple B’nai Israel’s 2021 Susan & Barry Koh February Lecture Series includes three lectures discussing art movements and artists from post-WWII through 1976. Broadcast on consecutive Thursdays at 7:00 PM, February 4, 11, and 18, via Zoom webinar, the series will feature three acclaimed curators in the contemporary art space. These lectures are open to the public at no charge but viewers are required to register in advance.

Rabbi Peter Hyman, of Temple B’nai Israel, said that “while the pandemic has robbed us of loved ones and physical connection to friends and family, we hope that this contemporary art series will in some small way bring together our community.”

Norman L. Kleeblatt, esteemed former Curator of The Jewish Museum in New York City, begins the contemporary art series on February 4 at 7:00 p.m., with his presentation on Abstract Expressionism: Artists & Critics.

Kleeblatt will present artists from the New York School, also known as the Abstract Expressionists, who took independent routes towards their distinctive signature styles. Kleeblatt will also examine Mark Rothko in the context of his contemporaries, including Jackson Pollock, Lee Krasner, Willem de Kooning, and Clyfford Still, among others, with a particular focus on the ideas and aesthetic preferences of the luminary critics of the period, Harold Rosenberg, and Clement Greenberg.

On February 11, Catherine J. Morris, the Sackler Senior Curator for the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art at the Brooklyn Museum, will present a lecture on the exhibition Seductive Subversion: Women Pop Artists, 1958–1968.

Morris will examine the impact of women artists on the traditionally male-dominated field of Pop art. It reconsiders the narrow definition of the Pop art movement and reevaluates its critical reception. In recovering important female artists, the exhibition expanded the canon to reflect more accurately women artists working internationally during this period.

Morris will discuss artworks by Chryssa, Niki de Saint Phalle, Rosalyn Drexler, Marisol, Yayoi Kusama, Jann Haworth, Vija Celmins, Lee Lozano, Marjorie Strider, Idelle Weber, and Joyce Wieland, among others.

The final program of the Susan & Barry Koh February Lecture Series on February 18 is titled Roy Lichtenstein: History in the Making, presented by Marshall N. Price. Price is the Nancy A. Nasher and David J. Haemisegger Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University. He will examine the period before Lichtenstein’s signature use of Ben Day dots in his Pop paintings and discuss how Pop art emerged in dialogue with European modernism, American history painting, and a diversity of vernacular sources.

Price will also tell the story of Lichtenstein’s brief but instrumental flirtation with abstraction in 1959 and 1960. Coinciding with the mainstreaming of Abstract Expressionism, these paintings illustrate how the artist was inspired to engage with the movement’s pervasive influence, but not without inserting his characteristic humor and wit.

The Susan & Barry Koh February Lecture Series is an annual production of Temple B’nai Israel – The Satell Center for Jewish Life on the Eastern Shore. Registration for the three lectures can be found at www.BnaiIsraelEaston.org. For further information, please call 410-822-0553.