V.S.O.P (Very Special One-Time Performance)

Milford’s Home-Grown Jazz Trio with Bill Jones on Tenor Saxophone and Billy Buss on Trumpet

Following the death of the late great trumpeter Miles Davis, the members of his second great quintet, none other than Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Tony Williams, and Ron Carter, joined forces with jazz great, trumpeter Freddy Hubbard for a “very special one-time performance,” that is, “V.S.O.P.” for short. So special was the performance that it could not be limited to just one time. The band recorded a catalogue of material while each of its members continued to be individually successful as a recording artist and performer. This year the Homefield Credit Union Jazz at the Sorrento series will present its own take on the concept of V.S.O.P.

Milford’s Home-Grown Jazz Trio has only once previously worked within a classic jazz quintet of trumpet, tenor saxophone, piano, bass, and drums playing from the repertoire that made this combination of instruments “classic.” That singular performance was the finale to the 2022-23 season when the trio was joined by saxophonist Bill Jones, who recently release the album Two Different Worlds, and trumpeter/arranger Greg Hopkins (whose resumé boasts collaborations with the likes of Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitgerald, Buddy Rich, and Stevie Wonder, to name a few). This season, the “classic” jazz quintet will again be assembled, but the trumpet chair will be occupied by Billy Buss, who has yet to attain the age of 40, but already boasts a resumé that puts him amongst the region’s highest caliber of players and educators.

Buss’s accolades include recognition by DownBeat Magazine, the National Foundation for the Advancement in the Arts, the Whitehouse (as a Presidential Scholar in the Arts), and as the second-place finisher at the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz International Trumpet Competition. Buss, a Berklee College of Music alumnus, now teaches full-time at the college. While Buss’s performance with saxophonists Jones this February promises to be “very special,” his commute from the north shore may pose a challenge for repeat performances, hence the caution to our audience that this may indeed be a “one-time” event.

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