Helio Alves Quartet Plays Shape Shifter Lab in Brooklyn Tonight

Helio Alves Quartet will play the Shapeshifter Lab tonight, April 3rd at 8:15pm. The quartet features Helio Alves: Piano; Mike Moreno: Guitar; Peter Slavov: Bass; and Alex Kautz: Drums.

The Shape Shifter Lab is located at 18 Whitwell Place, Brooklyn, NY. For more information, call (646) 820-9452 or visit www.helioalvesmusic.com.

According to the biography on his website, "Helio Alves was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in 1966 and started piano lessons at age 6. Following his early immersion in playing the pop standards and classical music favored by his parents, he gravitated to jazz in his teens. Alves moved to Boston to study at Berklee College of Music and received his BA in 1990. In Boston he met trumpeter Claudio Roditi, who advised the 24-year old pianist to move to New York City, and urged him to get in touch when he arrived. Alves eventually moved to New York City in 1993.

"Since then pianist and composer Helio Alves has received high praise as an in-demand sideman with Joe Henderson, Yo-Yo Ma, Paquito D'Rivera, Gato Barbieri, Dave Samuels, Airto Moreira & Flora Purim and Oscar Castro-Neves, to name but a few. Alves has recorded two Reservoir releases with Roditi, Samba Manhattan Style (1995) and Double Standards (1997). He is also featured on Roditi's 2009 release "Brazilliance X4 (Resonance) as well as "Simpatico" (Resonance 2010).

"From 1995 to 1997, Alves toured extensively with Joe Henderson's DoubleRainbow Quartet celebrating the music of Antonio Carlos Jobim, and was featured in the Grammy-winning release, Joe Henderson's Big Band (Verve, 1996). Alves was the pianist on Grammy-winning releases by Yo-Yo Ma (Obrigado Brazil, 2003) and Paquito D'Rivera (Brazilian Dreams, 2002), and on the Grammy-nominated Samba Jazz Fantasia (Malandro Records, 2002), by Duduka Da Fonseca, and "Forests" (Zoho Music 2008) by the "Brazilian Trio", that he co leads with Da Fonseca and bassist Nilson Matta.

"His growing discography includes releases by Rosa Passos (Amorosa, SONY/Classical, 2004), Joyce (Samba Jazz e Outras Bossas, Far Out Recordings, 2007 and "Slow Music, Biscoito Fino, 2009), Louis Hayes ( The Time Keeper, 2009), Slide Hampton (Slide Plays Jobim, 2002), Sadao Watanabe (Sadao With Brazilian Friends, Warner 2010) and Gino Sitson (Bamisphere, 2005, and Way To Go, 2009). He's also been featured on recordings and performances with The Caribbean Jazz Project, Phil Woods, Herbie Mann, Gal Costa, Sadao Watanabe, Randy Brecker, Don Braden, Santi Debriano, Hendrik Meurkens, Paul Winter, David Sanchez, Harry Allen, The New York Voices, Andy Narell, Mike Stern among many others.

"Helio has also released four albums under his own name: "Trios" (Reservoir Music, 1998), featuring John Patitucci, Al Foster, Nilson Matta and Duduka Da Fonseca, "Portrait in Black & White" (Reservoir Music, 2004) featuring Matt Wilson and Santi Debriano, "It's Clear" (Reservoir Music, 2009) featuring Romero Lubambo, Scott Colley and Ernesto Simpson and "Musica" with Antonio Sanchez, Reuben Rogers, Claudio Roditi and Romero Lubambo."