Guadalajara-born and San Diego-based jazz trumpeter Gilbert Castellanos and his quintet wowed audience members on Thursday, April 20 with a grand tour of jazz a’la John Coltrane. The lively performance, held in UC San Diego Park & Market’s Guggenheim Theatre, was part of the Intersections concert series.
Castellanos is a nationally renowned musician, composer, curator, educator, and arranger—and one of the country’s top-call jazz trumpeters. For over a decade, he has been a member of The Clayton Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, performing around the world and recording with the acclaimed big band. He is a six-time San Diego Music Awards winner, taking home honors of the Best Jazz Artist and Artist of the Year awards.
He is widely known and revered in the San Diego region and has jazz-centric partnerships with The San Diego Symphony (Jazz @ The Jacobs/Bayside Summer Nights Jazz), The San Diego Museum of Art (Portraits In Jazz/The Wednesday Jazz Jam & Young Lions Series @ Panama 66), The San Diego Ballet (Resident Composer for Ritmos Latinos), and The Westgate Hotel (My Musical Heroes/Sunset Poolside Jazz Series).
Additionally, Castellanos founded The Young Lions Jazz Conservatory in 2016 to help provide today’s middle- and high-school-age musicians with the same opportunities he had in his youth. He currently serves as the conservatory’s artistic director, living out his passion for jazz education. Castellanos continues to explore new opportunities to fulfill his personal mission of keeping jazz alive in San Diego and throughout the world.
Intersections at Park & Market is an interdisciplinary event series presented by UC San Diego Division of Extended Studies at UC San Diego Park & Market downtown. Intersections offers new, diverse takes on traditional ideas and forms in a variety of disciplines. Events include concerts and other artistic performances, spoken word, educational presentations and lectures, demonstrations, and more.
The series is curated by Andrew Waltz, Director of Arts Management at Park & Market, along with leading ethnographer-artist Yale Strom, who also serves as host of the concert series offering authentic explorations of global music. Following each performance, Strom moderates a Q&A session with the artists, an opportunity for attendees to be further inspired and develop a deeper appreciation for the artist’s craft.
Future Intersections events are listed online at parkandmarket.ucsd.edu/series/intersections. For more information about creative, cultural, and civic engagement collaborations, or about Intersections at Park & Market, please contact Andrew Waltz, Director, Arts Management, UC San Diego Park & Market, at awaltz@ucsd.edu.
For more information about Intersections and other upcoming events at Park & Market, please visit: parkandmarket.ucsd.edu/events/