Rebecca Zapen directing her son
Starting off our Live Music Showcase with “The Girl from Ipanema” you’ll be hard pressed to miss the duo being jazz oriented. The mother / son pair is comprised of mother, Rebecca Zapen, and her son Joel Douglass. Touching on the classical roots of jazz, Zapen’s violin pairs flawlessly with Douglass’s piano. As they harmonize over the famous jazz standard you can hear the work that they have put into their craft. The smooth melodies they described as “infectious” left me in fact humming the melodies for a good ten minutes after their performance. The breezy tunes give feelings of relief and contentment, leaving the listener feeling at ease. Though the duo favors jazz the two play many genres, covering not only jazz and bossanova, but also classical, singer-songwriter, and even as far as soundtracks.
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Rebecca Zapen, violinist
Studying violin from the age of three, Zapen has deep roots in music. Coming from a musical family, she is the third generation of musicians. Her son Joel Douglass, marks four generations. Zapen’s album Nest received Florida’s Album of the Year, 2011 – but that is just a side note to the various awards she’s received throughout her career as a lifetime musician. She has four albums total released as of writing this. She is an instructor at Eckerd College here in Tampa, where she teaches violin and viola to her pupils, and is also a co-director of the string orchestra at the college.
Zapen’s talents extend beyond violin to other instruments, including guitar double bass, and others. She is originally from Jacksonville and has since grown to call St. Petersburg home to her and her musical family. Their family is a “musical” family in both senses of the word, her husband and former performance partner is now involved in theater and had to step away from the duo. Zapen stated “it’s really nice that Joel can step in”. Instead of choosing to face the camera, the two choose to face each other focusing on their interactions as they play.
I personally appreciated their sense of humor, choosing to play a song from Charlotte’s Web, a children’s movie about the fictional relationship between a spider and a pig on a farm. The song is filled with hilarity, displaying many jokes all in the form of rhymes. This was a nice intermission between their performances showing some of their character and own personality as a mother and son act.
Rebecca looking fondly at her son
Joel Douglass is actually a self taught pianist. At only sixteen, he is playing better than most adults. Because of this, he was recently awarded a scholarship for FSU’s Jazz Camp this year 2026. Studying jazz himself, you can tell how inspired he is by his depth of knowledge – during warm ups I heard him start to play “A Night in Tunisia” an early jazz classic, playing that among other notable jazz songs. Douglass has only recently started playing piano, but when you hear him, you’ll think that he’s a well established professional.
During our interview portion of the program, Douglass mentions how his family, a grandmother in particular, helped usher him along in his exploration of piano – pushing him in the right direction. He started on violin but instead eventually ended up choosing piano as his preferred instrument. Douglass plays an original solo piano piece for us live on the show, starting with alluring arpeggios, the song seems to reference the romantic era of classical.
Every Friday at 2PM EST our WMNF Live Music Showcase works hard to bring you live music. Tune in to 88.5 WMNF Tampa to hear the latest and greatest from South Florida and the surrounding areas. The showcase is available afterwards here on the website for your further enjoyment. You can also catch the Live Music Showcase streamed via our Facebook page and YouTube page: