It’s Meet Pink Martini Time again, featuring our versatile vocalist and percussionist Timothy Nishimoto. He has been a key voice in concert and on Pink Martini albums since he joined the band permanently in 2003, after many appearances with us as a guest singer. A magnetic presence on stage with his smooth suits and even smoother dance moves, we keep him busy on numerous percussion instruments when he’s not front and center on the microphone. Timothy grew up in Los Angeles before settling in Oregon, and is also a noted sommelier and restaurateur, as well as being Pink Martini social media’s backstage tour documenter! He and his partner live in the beautiful countryside outside of Portland, with their giant and wonderful Bernese Mountain Dogs.

1. What is your favorite Pink Martini song to perform?

​U Plavu Zoru. It is so lush, and dramatic, painful, and beautiful. I love being on stage surrounded by strings when we perform it with symphonies. I get chills every time!

2. What Pink Martini song gets stuck in your head?

​Whenever there’s a new song we are working on, or it’s new to our repertoire. Read More...

It’s time for another installment of Meet Pink Martini and this week we are featuring force of nature Storm Large! She has been a lightning bolt of energy at the center of the concert stage with Pink Martini since being pressed into duty with less than a week’s notice in April 2011, taking over lead singing duties for four Pink Martini performances at the Kennedy Center while China Forbes underwent emergency vocal cord surgery. She’s brandished her Valkyrie voice on the stage and in the studio with Pink Martini ever since, fitting in occasional appearances with our band in the middle of a road warrior performance calendar, including gigs with her own band Le Bonheur, as well as numerous appearances with many of the world’s top symphony orchestras. She’s performed on every Pink Martini album starting with 2013’s Get Happy, and has released her own solo album, Le Bonheur, on Heinz Records as well.

1. If you could have seen any musician in concert, dead or alive, whom you never got to see live, who would it be?
Nina Simone

2. Read More...

One might say our versatile bass player Phil Baker (right, in the photo above, with trombonist Robert Taylor) is slumming it with Pink Martini; after all, he’s performed and toured with legendary musicians such as Diana Ross, Joe Henderson, Bobby Hutcherson, Sonny Stitt, and many more, including Motown greats such as Smokey Robinson and Marvin Gaye at the prestigious Motown 25 performance. But we’ve been lucky to have him grounding us with his rock solid upright bass in the studio and on tour since 2003. A native of Salem, Oregon, Phil wrote the original song “Cante e dance” for our 2006 album Hey Eugene. A live performance video of that song featuring Phil on acoustic guitar is now up on our Youtube channel, which you can watch here.

1. If you could have seen any musician in concert, dead or alive, who you never got to see live, who would it be?

John Coltrane

2. What is your favorite Pink Martini song to perform?

Cante e Dance. (Of course)

3. What Pink Martini song gets stuck in your head? Read More...

It’s time for another weekly installment of “Meet Pink Martini”. This week we give you Andrew Borger, the newest member of our little orchestra and our secret agent of the drum kit. This road warrior has provided the pulse for numerous legendary musicians, from Tom Waits to Norah Jones to kd lang, and has performed on the Grammys, Sesame Street and Saturday Night Live (could you ask for a better tv resume?). He’s far too nice to be so talented, but somehow he manages. Relocating from Brooklyn to Portland with his partner and daughter in 2016, Andrew joined Pink Martini in 2018 and quickly became invaluable to us both in the recording studio and on the concert stage. We asked him a number of our favorite questions; feel free to ask additional questions to Andy in the comments section!

1. If you could have seen any musician in concert, dead or alive, who you never got to see live, who would it be?
The second Miles Davis quintet

2. What Pink Martini song gets stuck in your head?
Lilly, because my kid asks to hear it 73 times per day. Read More...

It’s time for another installment in our weekly “Meet Pink Martini” series, a deep dive with the many interesting and unique individuals that make up our “little orchestra”. This week we are featuring our trumpeter Gavin Bondy. Born and raised in Portland, Oregon, Gavin is an iconic member of Pink Martini, joining the band over 20 years ago, and performing on every Pink Martini album starting with our debut record Sympathique. One of our most recognizable musicians, Gavin also has lent his trumpeting acrobatics to his own classic jazz band, The Shanghai Woolies, and currently also performs with Kate & the Crocodiles. When not tossing plunger mutes in the air after hot trumpet solos, Gavin toils in his garden under the watchful eyes of his coyote dogs Timber and Wiley.

Below are our favorite answers from the list of questions we posed to everyone in the band. Enjoy!

1. If you could have seen any musician in concert, dead or alive, who you never got to see live, who would it be?
Johann Sebastian Bach

2. What is your favorite Pink Martini song to perform? Read More...

Hello fellow Pink Quarantinos, we are excited to share with you a new weekly series called “Meet Pink Martini”, a deep dive into the many interesting and unique individuals that make up our “little orchestra”. While the band is on this unfortunate but important tour hiatus, we thought everyone could use a little distraction from their quarantining, so we asked our musicians and crew some fun and interesting questions to share with you all. The responses have been a great glimpse of the personalities of our brilliant musicians and crew members who spend up to six months a year on tour, bringing our music all over the world.

First up today is our exquisite and studly violinist Nicholas Crosa. Nick joined Pink Martini in 2005, and has performed on every studio album starting with Hey Eugene. He started playing the violin at age 6, was galavanting around the country making appearances with orchestras by the ripe young age of 11, and won prestigious scholarships to study at the world-renowned Juilliard School of Music. His rich and exuberant tone is a cornerstone of the band’s romantic sound. Read More...