Jim Robitaille Trio
Biography Jim Robitaille Trio
Jim Robitaille
Guitarist and award winning composer, Jim Robitaille, has performed and or recorded and shared the bill with jazz greats Dave Liebman, Karl Berger, Bob Moses, Joe Beck, Gerry Gibbs, Santi Debriano, Julian Lage, Esperanza Spalding, Oscar Stagnaro, Vic Juris, Kate McGarry, Eric Wyatt, Pop singer Billy Gilman, and the Dizzy Gillespie Alumni All-Stars, and has appeared on 30 recordings and documentary films including “To Music”, and “A View From Within” on WCS with the Jim Robitaille Group featuring NEA Jazz master Dave Liebman. His latest release on WCS with the Jim Robitaille Trio is called Space Cycles.
His television and live performances include: The BET Jazz Channel, The Time Warner Music Choice Jazz Channel, PBS Television, The Baird Auditorium at the Smithsonian Institute's Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C, The Bearsville Theatre, Woodstock, N.Y, the Berklee College of Music, Ryles Jazz Club International, Narrows Center for the Arts, The Wang Center, Boston, MA, The Knitting Factory and Smoke in New York, Quai Des Brumes, Montreal, QC, Canada, Gallerie Larouge, Quebec City, QC, Canada, Club Nectar VT, Veterans Memorial Auditorium, Providence, R.I., Zeiterion Theater, Habitats for Humanity, and tours in the US, and abroad.
The Jim Robitaille Group's debut recording entitled "To Music" featuring saxophonist Dave Liebman, received international critical acclaim winning three international composition awards for three of his compositions from the recording. The CD was number five in the top ten list of 2004 by the Daily Ipirotikos Agon and the Apopsy in Greece and was the publishers pick for All About Jazz and the Boston Herald. The recording received international airplay and was #1 chart-bound on the JazzWeek Jazz chart. His recording A View From Within on also features Dave Liebman and made the top 100 on JazzWeek as well as Royal Stokes top ten jazz releases of 2109.
Awards include The 9th Annual Thelonious Monk International Jazz Composers Competition sponsored by BMI, The 2002 Great American Song Contest First Place Instrumental Category, and The 2002 Great American Song Contest Outstanding Achievement in Songwriting Award. Other accolades include The 2011 Assets For Artists Grant, The Julius Hemphill Jazz Composers Alliance Competition, The International Songwriting Contest, Budrus documentary film, and numerous performance grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council For the Arts.
Jim has studied guitar and improvisation with jazz guitarist Jon Damian at the Berklee College of Music, Boston, MA, and improvisation with Charlie Banacos. Robitaille has performed concerts and taught workshops, classes, clinics, and master-classes in Quebec Canada, St John U.S.V.I, Westfield State College, Berklee College of Music, Brandeis University, Holyoke Community College, The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, Cape Cod Community College, Connecticut College, Western New England College, Bristol Community College, Falmouth Academy, and Tabor Academy, and is an applied jazz guitar lecturer, ensemble director, and founder and director of the Performance Jam Session Series on the Jazz Faculty at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.
