Max Perkoff

My earliest memories are of listening to my father, the great jazz pianist Si Perkoff, jam and rehearse in our San Francisco apartment. My mother, the equally great artist Sara Goren was an avid music fan as well.  Art on the walls, artists, poets, and musicians hanging out in our home combined with the music of Bach, Woody Guthrie, Ellington, Bird, 'Trane, Miles, Monk, and so much more. I loved it all from the start.

I received my B.M. in Jazz Studies from Indiana University School of Music in 1985. The great Philadelphia Orchestra alum M. Dee Stewart taught me trombone. Cheryl Tchanz and Eduard Auer were my piano teachers. 

I have performed at Yoshi's in Oakland & San Francisco, The Herbst Theatre and Jazz At Pearl's in San Francisco, 142 Throckmorton and The Sweetwater in Mill Valley, and many other SF Bay Area venues.

Touring has included Jazz At Lincoln Center, The Iridium, The Triad, La Mama Theater, The Encore, The Metropolitan Room, and other New York City venues; as well as clubs in Los Angeles, Chicago, and Reno, Nevada.

Extensive sideman work has included jazz, cabaret, rock & pop performance with Vicki Burns, Lou Christie, John Cippolina, Chris Clark, Linda Clifford, Terese Genecco, Terry Gibbs, Jon Hendricks, Dan Hicks, Noel Jewkes, Harold Jones Big Band, Harry James Orchestra, Linda Kosut, Johnny Mathis, Kim Nalley, Sherri Payne, King Perkoff, Si Perkoff, Bobby Rydell,  Cami Thompson & The Cosmopolitans,  Mike Vax, and Kenny Washington. 

Recordings include:

1. Bridges" The San Francisco Wind Symphony 2018.
2. Brooklyn Battery" Manny Moka. 2014.  
3. Long As You're Living - The songs and poetry of Oscar Brown Jr." Linda Kosut vocals with the Max Perkoff Band. 2007.
4. "Infinite Search" The Max Perkoff Band. 2006.
5. Monk’s Bones” with special guest Roswell Rudd and Monk’s Music Trio, 2006. This CD reached #10 on the national jazz radio play list,
6. “Flute Vibes” Gerald Beckett. 2006. This CD reached #14 on the national jazz radio play list.   
7. “Amazing Space,” 2005. Duo with father Si Perkoff.    
8. “Bigbandjazz.net” 2002. Mike Vax Jazz Orchestra. Summit Records. 
9. “Off The Ground,” 2000. The Max Perkoff Jazz Ensemble.

My band is usually a quartet, but can be smaller or larger as needed.  I'm interested in combining traditional jazz styles with the music of my Jewish soul.  That means both Middle Eastern and Eastern European folk music, klezmer, and popular dance styles.

Here's some of our press.  

"The Max Perkoff Band is a tight outfit. They lean into each other, read emotion and movement, and come up with a cohesive musicality that evolves in several styles. At the outset they find their reckoning in a bop beat in “New Life.” The tune is enough to make one salivate for more and the band does not disappoint....Perkoff shows his lyrical side on the piano as well, his notes flowing with gentle, rippling passion." - Jerry D'Souza, allaboutjazz.com

"Perkoff is influenced by J.J. Johnson and is a chordal-based bop soloist at heart, but his improvisations are unpredictable and are free of clichés. He held his own with Roswell Rudd in his previous record Monk’s Bones, and he excels with his modern mainstream quartet. "Infinite Search" should result in Max Perkoff becoming better known and rated high among modern jazz trombonists." - Scott Yanow, Los Angeles Jazz Scene