Chris Mondak

Biography

Bassist and composer Chris Mondak has lived in Nashville since 2020. Chris studied with bass legends Cecil McBee and Dave Holland at the New England Conservatory (B.M., 2020). Prior to that, Chris was active in the Champaign Central HS music program, where he was a three-time Illinois all-state musician, receiving commendations from Essentially Ellington, Music for All, the Brubeck Institute, YoungArts, and Jazz at Lincoln Center.

Chris has played with Wycliffe Gordon, Dave Douglas, Wayne Escoffery, Melanie Charles, Shelly Berg, Marvin Stamm, Jesus Molina, Jeff Hamilton, and Matt Savage. Chris has toured in the U.S., and has played in Australia, Mexico and Panama, and toured twice in China. Chris has performed at venues such as Birdland, Bop Stop, Jazz at Lincoln Center-Shanghai, Carnegie Hall, Rudy’s, and Breezy’s.

In 2023, Chris released his 3rd CD, Blank with Colour (Summit Records), a lively collection of jazz-funk tunes including eight of Chris’s original compositions plus covers of the classics songs “Cruel to Be Kind” (Nick Lowe) and “Affirmation” (composed by Jose Feliciano and made famous by George Benson).

Chris’s 2022 CD Glass Spheres (Summit Records), which features seven of Chris’s compositions, spent multiple weeks in the top 100 of the Jazz Week chart, and reached #17 on the NACC chart. Chris also has written tracks for his 2019 CD Eternal Youth, and those of his jazz combos West of Staley and the Nextgen Jazz Quartet, and rock band NxT.

Chris has received international composition and performance awards from the Italian organization 7 International Jazz Club (2023, for “Begetting,” a semi-finalist in the under 25 category), and the Hengqin Cup Jazz Competition in Zhuhai, China (2019, 1st place for “Always Smiling” as the festival’s top original composition).