Ricky Berger wins “Best Song” at Songwriters at Play: The Finale

Maggie Dave producer & singer/songwriter Ricky Berger took home the “Best Song” award this Sunday at Songwriters at Play: The Finale, presented by Cambria Center for the Arts. The live concert featured ten finalists from the previous year’s showcases performing two original songs each. Berger’s “Novocaine” earned top marks and the grand prize for songwriting from the panel of judges, with Fort Vine and Walk the Whale winning “Best Performance” and “Best Overall” respectively. Will Breman, semifinalist from NBC’s The Voice, closed out the evening with selections from his upcoming opening set for Neil Young.

 Listen to more of Ricky Berger’s music on Spotify!

Ethan Chilton +4 plays Sam First

Maggie Dave trumpeter and composer Ethan Chilton played an electrifying night of jazz at Sam First in Los Angeles with his +4 combo. An evening of rarely-played standards, free improvisation and original compositions took center stage with Jeremy Stein (tenor sax), Logan Kane (bass), Adam Hersh (piano) and Ben Ring (drums). Chilton most recently released his first full-length album, The Planets, exploring the solar system through colorful harmonies and inventive textures. "Resonance," recorded entirely remotely with members of the USC Thornton Jazz Orchestra and USC Thornton Symphony, played together virtually with an urgency emphasizing the core theme of the record - Earth's climate crisis. "The craziest part about the universe is that it doesn’t care if we’re not here," says Chilton. "Humans need to become a multi-planetary species one day soon, and hopefully not so we can destroy another world like we’re doing to the Earth, but so that our species can live on in the event of a catastrophic natural disaster."

When Chilton isn’t writing and recording his own music, he can frequently be found as a sideman in the LA bands of John Beasley, Remy LeBoeuf, Clare Fischer, and more. He’s performed with Terri Lyne Carrington, SAJE, Patrice Rushen, Geoff Keezer, Louis Cole/Genevieve Artadi, and Bob Mintzer, among others.