Richard Saunders is an eighteen year old surviving the Connecticut suburbs by making music too soulfulicious to be ignored. Claiming influences from Donny Hathaway to Ella Fitzgerald to Björk, his musical blend of jazz, pop, and hip hop sounds like a young Michael Bublé who spent his first few years of high school in Harlem. He plays the piano and writes songs to sing with his band, Richard Saunders and the too-cool-for-yous, which consists of Jewish drumming prodigy Jake/Yakov Goldbas, Andrew Grandahl, and back-up singers Andrew Flynn, Shenel Johns, and Stephanie McAllister.
In a short amount of time, Richard has conquered every jazz vocal award that exists for a human of his age. He’s been a part of the Gibson/Baldwin GRAMMY Jazz Choir in 2007 and 2008, along with the first vocalist ever selected to sing with the Next Generation Jazz Orchestra in 2008. He won the silver award in jazz voice at the NFAA youngARTS week in 2008, and is one of twenty high school students selected by the U.S. Department of Education to be a Presidential Scholar in the Arts. These opportunities have allowed him to sing in venues such as the Kennedy Center, North Sea, and Monterey Jazz Festivals.
Having mastered the fine art of scatting, he pushes that all aside and gets down to business. His no-nonsense approach to harmony and lyrics allow him to succinctly speak his mind about the destitution and weirdness of living in the suburbs. No doubt, this Berklee Songwriting Contest and Young Guns 2008 Battle of the Bands award-winning group of musicians will have much to say as they travel up to the city of Boston next fall.
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