Dr. Julian’s Yes Yes

Yes to jazz, yes to world music. Yes to tradition, yes to new ideas. Yes to sophistication, yes to funk. Original music steeped in jazz and sparkling with rhythms and instruments from the Caribbean, Eastern Europe and the Arabic world. Melodic and driving, thoughtful but audience-friendly. Dr. Julian’s Yes Yes has it both ways.

Julian Gerstin, percussion, composer, is a veteran of many jazz, African and Latin bands. He has appeared with jazz icons Sheila Jordan and Charles Neville; Afropop stars Orlando Julius, Baba Ken Okulolo and Zulu Spear; and has also worked in Eastern European and Arabic music, punk, funk, choral music, and theater composition. In addition to the Sextet, Julian currently leads the Brazilian group Sambaganza and performs traditional Puerto Rican drumming with Bomba de Aquí. Much of Julian’s music stems from his two years living in Martinique, studying and performing traditional music. Julian has an MFA in Music Composition and, yes, a PhD.

With Yes Yes, Julian takes a step beyond his previous group, the JG Sextet. That group released its third CD, Songbirds of the Deep Sea, on Truth Revolution Records in 2025, but already Julian was looking for musicians to treat his compositions more adventurously, as starting points rather than finished works. The personnel of Yes Yes is flexible, but all of the musicians enjoy taking chances.

Current members include:

Jason Robinson, saxophones, works primarily with his group the Janus Ensemble, which includes Liberty Ellman, Angelica Sanchez and Ches Smith, among others. The group has released four CDs of Jason’s so complexly beautiful compositions. He has appeared with George Lewis, Anthony Davius, Myra Melford, Rudresh Mahanthappa, Raphe Malik, Toots and the Maytals, and numerous other contemporary jazz and world music luminaries. Jason is a professor of music at Amherst College.

Paul Austerlitz, bass clarinet, is one of the country’s leading jazz voices on his instrument. Paul’s travels have taken him to the Dominican Republic and Haiti, where he worked in numerous top bands. He composes and performs with his own group, Voudou Jazz. As a scholar, Paul has published books on Black and Diasporic music and Dominican merengue.

Don Anderson, trumpet, is a veteran of numerous groups including the Vermont Jazz Center Big Band, Zara Bode Little Big Band, Green Street Quintet, Dr. Burma, and New England Transcendental Brass Band.

Andrew Wilcox, piano, is the group’s youngest member. A protegé of Grammy Award-winning pianist Zaccai Curtis, Andrew is quickly establishing himself as a rising star in both jazz and Latin music circles.

Wes Brown, bass: Wes’s first professional gig, at the age of eighteen, was two years on the road with jazz legend Earl “Fatha” Hines. He has since worked with luminaries Wadada Leo Smith, Anthony Davis, Marilyn Crispell, Fred Ho, and numerous others.

Ben James, drum set: Ben’s credits include work with John Tchicai, Olatunji, Green Mountain Mambo, and others.

BLINK was formed in the summer of 2024, of Boston improvisers led by Dutch/American saxophonist Jorrit Dijkstra, as an extension of The Porch Trio. The band uses a microtonal tuning system between the instruments, which gives it a mesmerizing and dreamy sound, full of collective melodic and multi-rhythmic layerings. Dijkstra’s compositions form a spring board for open improvisations, inspired by group behavioral patterns such as swarms of insects or birds, and with references to African high life and kalimba music, Indonesian gamelan and delta blues guitar styles. BLINK’s first album was released on Driff Records. In February 2026 BLINK featured Dutch vocal acrobat Jaap Blonk, under the project name BLINK + Blonk, playing Jaap’s compositions.