Saxophone and flute player Paul Lieberman has been crossing boundaries with his music for a long time.  Reviewers, listeners, and fellow performers call Paul “inspired” and “inspiring,” citing the “joy,” “understanding,” “commitment,” and “heart” in his music, and the “great lyricism,” “supreme facility,” and “impeccable time” with which he plays.  After a session at Mickey Hart’s, Gil Evans noted to Airto: “everything he plays sounds right,” and David Sanborn responded to a show at New York’s Village Gate with a surprise kiss!

Paul earned his BA in Music at Yale University in 1978, and began freelancing in New York, where he studied privately with Kenny Werner, Dave Liebman, and Lee Konitz, and supplemented his income accompanying dance classes for Merce Cunningham Studio, Dan Wagoner, NYU and Princeton University.  It was during this period, while working with Grammy nominee Thiago de Mello’s Brazilian big band “Amazon,” that Paul began developing the unique approach to the piccolo with which he consistently ignites audiences.

Paul responded to simultaneous tour invitations in 1982 from Buddy Rich and Brazilian Jazz legends Airto and Flora Purim by becoming the only “gringo” in the all-Brazilian group, and toured the US for the next two years, where he appeared at major clubs, theaters, and festivals, performed for audiences of up to 30,000, and made his Lincoln Center debut.

An invitation to move to Brazil led Paul to Rio de Janeiro from 1985 to 1989, where he found the love of his life, assimilated so completely he was regularly presumed a native, and became Brazil’s first call studio sax and flute player, recording on over 50 albums and many jingles and TV soundtracks, which in turn led to arranging and producing work for CBS, Warner, and other labels.  During this period he acquired an extraordinary knowledge of Brazilian music and musicians.

Paul has performed and/or recorded with Pat Metheny, David Sanborn, The Allman Brothers, Don Grusin, Jaco Pastorius, Mickey Hart, Taj Mahal, Rufus Reid, Jaki Byard, David “Fathead” Newman, Bernard Purdy, Lew Soloff, Paquito D’Rivera, Ronnie Foster, Claudio Roditi, Dick Oatts, Conrad Herwig, Brian Lynch, Wayne Bergeron, Arturo O’Farrill, Dave Samuels, Toninho Horta, Romero Lubambo, Duduka da Fonseca, Nilson Matta, Bobby Sanabria, The Temptations, David Byrne, the Springfield Symphony, as well as Brazilian stars such as Simone, Chico Buarque, Djavan, Milton Nascimento, Leny Andrade, Alcione, Joao Bosco, Miucha, and Roberto Carlos, along with a veritable Who’s Who of Brazil’s top instrumental artists, including Hermeto Pascoal, Cesar Camargo Mariano, and many, many others.

In addition to extended gigs at such New York music shrines as Sweet Basil and SOB’s and national tours of the U.S. and Brazil, Paul has also performed in Australia, Belgium, Canada, England, Germany, Hawaii, Norway, Poland, Switzerland, and Wales.

After a temporary 2006 appointment as Adjunct Professor of Jazz Theory and Improvisation at UMass Amherst, Paul earned his Master’s degree in Jazz Composition and Arranging there while still teaching, and was then appointed full-time Jazz Faculty for the next two years.  He also makes Featured Artist, Master Class, and Adjudication appearances at high schools and colleges.

Paul’s 2011 CD “Ibeji”, features a number of legendary musicians:  Rufus Reid & Nilson Matta on bass, Duduka da Fonseca, Tim Horner, and Allman Brothers co-founder Jaimoe on drums, and Joel Martin on piano.  The CD looks at Brazilian music and American jazz as twin children of Mother Africa separated at birth and raised in separate parts of the world, and showcases Paul’s playing, composition and arranging.

Other recent activities include repeat appearances as featured guest soloist with Grammy Award winner Arturo O’Farrill’s Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra, regular appearances with the groups of numerous other Grammy winners, including Jaimoe, Brazilian composer/multi-instrumentalist Thiago de Mello, hornist/composer John Clark, and pianist/composers Paul Sullivan and Jeffrey Wayne Holmes, and creation of the wind/percussion music for three different productions by the world renowned Young@Heart Chorus, subject of an award winning Fox Searchlight documentary.  A new saxophone quartet co-founded with Gary Smulyan, Marty Ehrlich, and Jason Robinson debuts in April 2011, and Paul was named to the editorial board of the journal “Analytical Approaches to World Music” in 2010.