Recipient Information
Location
Whitefish, Montana
Project Title
The Swing Resistance
Year of Award
2025
Grant or Fellowship
Jazz Road Creative Residencies Grant
Grant Amount
$34,000
The Swing Resistance, a jazz protest project featuring original civil rights-themed songs, will partner with Whitefish Theatre Company for school clinics, rehearsals, a public performance with Q&A, and the production of a 30-minute documentary to be released online.
About the Artist
Multi-instrumentalist, educator and composer Erica von Kleist began her career as a saxophonist and flautist in the New York jazz scene. A native of Connecticut, Erica moved to the city to study at the renowned Juilliard School and in 2004 earned the first bachelor’s degree in jazz in the school’s history. After graduation, Erica’s next ten years were met with performances, tours and several recordings with various artists including the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, Darcy James Argue’s Secret Society, Chris Potter, Sean Jones, Rufus Reid, The Addams Family on Broadway among others. Honored with two ASCAP Young Jazz Composer Awards, several mentions in Downbeat's annual Readers and Critics Polls, and the Martin E. Segal Award from Lincoln Center, Erica extended her scope as a bandleader with the release of four commercial albums, one as a co-collaboration with tap dancer DeWitt Fleming Jr., live at Dizzy's Club NYC.
A teacher for over 20 years, Erica has always had a passion for education. In 2019 she released "A Cool Approach to Jazz Theory" a jazz theory workbook that has been used as a curriculum for middle and high school jazz programs worldwide. As a clinician, Erica has lectured in music business and performance at The Juilliard School, UNC Greensboro, among others, has been an adjudicator for the Essentially Ellington Festival, and a faculty member for Carnegie Hall’s NYO Jazz Program.
During her ten-year stint living in Whitefish, MT, Erica began several business endeavors including a nonprofit organization that brought live music to nursing homes and care facilities and a booking agency that provided live music for private events and weddings. She also paired up with some local filmmakers and writers and in 2020 co-produced an awardwinning musical comedy film "Your Musical is Cancelled. The Musical!". Having sparked her love of comedy, Erica is now back in NYC developing her work as a one-woman jazz comedy writer and performer. In addition to cultivating new songs and ideas, she is also the Managing Director of the International Association of Jazz Arrangers & Composers (ISJAC), and a music business faculty member at the Manhattan School of Music.