With Music Inspired By The Crime Novels of Fred Vargas

New York City CD Release Party
May 1, 2011 – 7:30 PM
at DROM
85 Avenue A (between 5th & 6th Streets)
New York, NY 10019
(212) 777-1157

If the evocative atmospheres and skewed, sinuous grooves of Les Nuages En France, the debut CD by the Marco Cappelli Acoustic Trio, conjure an air of mystery and suspense, credit their inspiration to the crime novels of author Fred Vargas.

A uniquely gifted guitarist who blends influences from the contemporary classical and avant-jazz/improv realms, Cappelli discovered the work of Vargas (the pseudonym of French historian Frédérique Audoin-Rouzeau) through a friend and was instantly drawn in by the writer’s unusual approach to the thriller.

“I found her books interesting because they’re not just suspense stories. I was touched by her psychological analysis of the characters, the way she used the pretext of a thriller story to analyze relationships between characters.”

Each piece on Les Nuages En France is named in reference to characters from Vargas’ novels, written in conjunction with similarly-inspired poems by Italian poet Barbara Raggi. Cappelli explains that his attraction to these novels stems from his father, a judge who instilled his humane philosophies into his son.

Photo Credit: Peter Gannushkin

“My father never treated the matter of being a judge like a mathematical thing: you murder somebody, you get this many years of jail,” Cappelli explains. “I grew up with the idea that you always have to consider the human aspect of judiciary cases; you always have to see the other side of the story.”

The album’s liner notes include a quote from the author explaining her distaste for the complex, extremely violent thrillers that make up most of the genre these days, from books to movies. Cappelli sympathized with that from his father’s personal experiences, and found Vargas’ comments similar to his own approach to music.

“The expression in music is something you have to make very simple,” he says. “That’s what I tried to do with these pieces, to have a very direct relation to the sound that I was working on with my partners in the trio. There’s no deep, intellectual thinking behind the playing. It’s pretty direct and based in the everyday musical experience I share with these musicians, but it has a deep feeling in it.”

Conservatory-trained in Rome and Basel, Cappelli became one of Europe’s leading contemporary classical guitarists. Since moving to New York, he has complemented his work in the classical world with extensive experience on the avant-garde and improv scenes. In addition to the Acoustic Trio, Cappelli leads or is a member of the Naples-based chamber group Ensemble Dissonanzen; Syntax Error, which performs music in accompaniment to films and images; and the NYC-based quintet Italian Doc Remix (IDR), which blends jazz and Italian folk music.

Cappelli assembled the Acoustic Trio as a showcase for his unusual custom-built instrument, an amplified classical guitar modified by the addition of eight sympathetic strings underneath the standard six. “You don’t have to talk with these guys,” Cappelli enthuses about his bandmates, bassist Ken Filiano and percussionist Satoshi Takeishi. “They play what you didn’t know you had in mind.”

Ken Filiano is a remarkably diverse bassist who has worked with artists including Nels Cline, Bobby Bradford, John Carter, Warne Marsh, Roswell Rudd, and Don Preston. He leads and composes for his quartet with Michael Attias, Tony Malaby, and Michael T.A. Thompson. Filiano and Cappelli first met while recording with pianist Anthony Coleman for John Zorn’s Tzadik label. “Ken is the king of acoustic bass,” Cappelli says. “His sound and his groove are amazing and his improvisational skill is just perfect.”

Japanese-born percussionist Satoshi Takeishi studied at Berklee College of Music in Boston and has developed a highly individual approach to rhythm and color, influenced by his studies in Colombia and the Middle East. He has worked with a wide array of musicians such as such as Eliane Elias, Eddie Gomez, Randy Brecker, Dave Liebman, Anthony Braxton, Mark Murphy, Herbie Mann, and the Paul Winter Consort. “Satoshi has a very special sound,” Cappelli says.

Release Date: March , 2011

Marco’s Website
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For more information on Marco Cappelli, please contact: Matt Merewitz / matt@fullyaltered.com or 347-384-2839.

Photo Credit: Emra Islek

December 7, 2010 (NYC) – With I Will Follow You (Bee Jazz), French-born, Brooklyn-based tenor and soprano saxophonist Jerome Sabbagh brings his singular vision to the fertile ground of improvised music. Bolstered by the broad color palate of virtuosic guitarist and longtime collaborator Ben Monder, and the masterful rhythmic orchestration of legendary drummer Daniel Humair, Sabbagh’s lyricism and glowing sound serve as beacons in an improvised journey at once hauntingly beautiful and aggressively unhinged.

Taking advantage of the adventurous setting of a trio without a bass, the players’ seamless interaction makes it impossible to discern who’s leading from who’s following, as they shepherd the listener through an ever-changing tapestry of sound. “Without a bass player, there’s less of a desire to go into time,” says Sabbagh “and it opens up new textural possibilities.”

Despite the constant risk taking – or perhaps because of it, the music is always compelling. “There’s this cliché that improvised music is hard to listen to,” Sabbagh notes. “Maybe I’m an idealist, but I find the best improvised music has a directness of expression that immediately draws the listener in.”

I Will Follow You follows three critically acclaimed efforts as a leader. North (voted Best CD of 2005 by the readers of French monthly magazine Jazzman) and Pogo (four stars in DownBeat) both feature Sabbagh’s uncanny, song-like compositions and lush tone, in a quartet that includes Monder, bassist Joe Martin, and drummer Ted Poor. One Two Three (four stars in DownBeat), an album of standards played in the totemic sax-bass-drums instrumentation pioneered by Sonny Rollins, features bassist Ben Street and drummer Rodney Green. I Will Follow You represents a bold departure from the more controlled settings of these albums, yet retains the lyricism, clarity of purpose, and melodic flair that are the hallmarks of the saxophonist’s style.

The smooth ebb and flow between tracks has an appealing narrative continuity, opening with the controlled chaos of the title track, which builds in anticipation as Humair moves from brushes to sticks and Monder answers him, at the flick of a pedal switch, with ferocious distortion. Other highlights include “Comptine”, a moody free ballad with echoes of Bartok and “The Clown,” an exploration of a simple melody that becomes increasingly dense as Sabbagh and Monder improvise symbiotically in chromatic counterpoint. I Will Follow You concludes with a sumptuous rendition of “I Should Care,” the album’s only standard.

“I spent a lot of time arranging the sequence of the record, trying to make it into something that could be listened to from start to finish,” Sabbagh remarks. “The tracks are short, especially for an album that’s mostly improvised. Everything was wide open, but we all strove for concision, which was good, since dragging things out is an easy mistake to make in a free setting.”

Sabbagh composed the music with the sounds of Monder and Humair in mind. He set out to avoid prefabricated compositional patterns by writing with pen and paper only, as opposed to sitting at the piano. Coupled with the six improvised pieces, miniatures of unfettered freedom and keen interplay, the compositions endow the album with a self-contained quality, “like a little world unto itself,” he says.

Though this is the first time they play together, the three players mesh with a psychic energy that would be impressive even for a longtime working band, a testament to Sabbagh and Monder’s exceptional musical bond, and to the 72-year-old Humair’s peerless listening ability. A first-call drummer in Europe whose career trajectory took him from playing bebop with the likes of Bud Powell and Dexter Gordon to improvising with avant-garde explorers Tony Malaby and Ellery Eskelin, the protean Humair was an obvious choice for the shifting dynamic of this trio.

“Daniel is a master free player but came up swinging with the best, and he is also a painter. Form is important to him, as it is for Ben and I,” says Sabbagh. “Even when we are playing free, we are ever-conscious of creating a narrative arc in the moment.”

Sabbagh was exposed to music at a young age by an early teacher, pianist and composer Annick Chartreux, who first inspired him to transcend the confines of genre, a lasting influence. “She would play the overture to Mozart’s The Magic Flute, ‘So What’ from Kind of Blue, and some Jimi Hendrix, all in the same listening session.” Since moving to New York in 1995, Sabbagh has played with Guillermo Klein, Bill Stewart, Billy Drummond, and Victor Lewis, in addition to numerous others.

Asked about his musical values, he explains: “The keys for me are melody, sound, and interaction. Each player weaves a unique voice into the collective in a way that makes sense with the material, while staying true to their inner song. I think the process of making good music with people is similar whatever the project may be.”

I Will Follow You is yet another exciting example of Sabbagh’s musicianship, integrity and artistic vision.

RELEASE DATE: December 7, 2010

Press:

“Mr. Sabbagh played with untroubled self-assurance, and his songs had a sleek and sturdy appeal. Just as crucially, his colleagues strove for the unexpected, individually and as an ensemble. [...] Mr. Sabbagh avoided direct allusions to the saxophone totems. What he is working toward, simply and effectively, is a sincerely personal vocabulary.”
- Nate Chinen, The New York Times

“You don’t find many post-bop era musicians recording programs of all standards; fewer still choose to do them in a pianoless trio. French native Jerome Sabbagh relishes the challenge with One Two Three (Bee Jazz) and his nerve pays off. Avoiding any of the usual stylistic cliches, Sabbagh lets these compositions speak for themselves. He’s not afraid to simply play the melody, although when the spirit strikes him he can spin out inspired improvisations.”
- James Hale, DownBeat (4 stars)

“Memorable tunes with assured performances […] Pogo sounds contemporary and vital, and the band delivers one of the year’s strongest ensemble performance.”
- Peter Margasak, DownBeat (4 stars)

“A refreshing, cliché-free young tenor and soprano saxophonist. In this, his second album as a leader and one including only his compositions, he creates moods as well as lines and spaces.”
- Owen Cordle, JazzTimes

“An exceptionally assured and compelling debut as a leader [...] The music is consistently evocative, tuneful and substantial.”
- Peter Hum, Ottawa Citizen

“Over the past few years of performing together, they’ve bonded, learned, and are continuing to define their sound.”
- Mark F. Turner, All About Jazz

“A startlingly good young jazz musician [...] Sabbagh chooses notes judiciously and swings firmly. And Sabbagh and North grow stronger and deeper with each listening.”
- Marc Meyers, All About Jazz

Links:

Jerome Sabbagh Official Website
Jerome Sabbagh Facebook Fan Page
Jerome Sabbagh on Myspace
Jerome Sabbagh on Twitter

For more information, please contact Matt Merewitz at Fully Altered Media /
(215) 629-6155 or matt@fullyaltered.com

November 30, 2010 (NYC) – There are many who embrace tradition, and jazz’s recent history is replete with acolytes of a certain era or style. Bass clarinetist Jason Stein is cut from a very different cloth however, and Three Kinds of Happiness, the new album by his trio, Locksmith Isidore, demonstrates just how deeply and completely he has assimilated the past—his own and that of the music–while maintaining his own voice, as a composer and as a performer.

The album’s title hails from Stein’s studies in philosophy at the University of Michigan, before he moved to Chicago in 2005, and even before he became a music major. “Simply put,” he explains, “It’s a Platonic concept concerning long-term relationships between happiness and sadness; for me, it’s about practicing, and specifically the idea that if I work through a problem thoroughly now, my future will be positively impacted in the process.”

Stein practices voraciously, and his dedication to his instrument is manifest in every note he plays on this, Locksmith Isidore’s third album and second with the current lineup of Stein, Jason Roebke on bass and Mike Pride on drums. Stein’s instrumental approach encompasses many shades of jazz via such influences as Eric Dolphy, John Coltrane and Archie Shepp. As with those masters, his playing can veer in a split second from consummate lyricism toward fire music with astonishing subtlety. “Coltrane’s later music was a formative influence on me, as he employed many of the great New Thing players,” muses Stein. “Compositionally though, Steve Lacy has been a model for me above most others.” Certainly his teachers have been formative influences, including David Murray, Charles Gayle and Donald Walden, but Lacy’s versatility is special to Stein. “I’ve tried to bring his diversity to Three Kinds of Happiness; I have a lot of respect for his ability to achieve such a broad stylistic scope while staying true to his own musical vision.”

The trio’s current emphasis on composition over improvisation constitutes a very conscious change in group aesthetics; it results from the release of Stein’s solo album on Leo Records and from the supporting tour, where improvisation guided much of the music. “I wanted to provide some more substance for us to explore,” Stein elucidates. Indeed, Stein’s ability to compose in both traditional forms and in freer structures is uncanny. From the sultry and wistful “Little Bird,” to the wicked whimsicality of “More Gone Door Gone,” he offers new wine in old bottles, expanding tradition while never leaving it. Even the intricate abstractions of compositions like “Arch and Shipp” embrace the middle ground between metered swing and the lack thereof in unpredictable ways. The trio sound is an integral component. “Michael, Jason and I have developed a real rapport,” states Stein, “and all nine of these compositions were written with their playing styles in mind.” The ensemble is Lacyesque in range, from sparseness to controlled vigor, and the track titles reflect Lacy’s love of words and humor.

For Stein, many of the titles also refer back to another tradition, one just as personal and just as deeply rooted as the music. They evoke his family history. The group’s name, which combines Stein’s paternal grandfather’s first name and occupation, is only one aspect of his family’s contribution to his musical development. “It was my father, who died when I was ten, that instilled in me my enthusiasm for music—not for any one type or style, but for music in general,” reminisces Stein. “I remember driving with him when I was five or six, and he was drumming on the steering wheel while listening to 1980s popular music. That made as much of an impression on me as did the music. I was overwhelmed by his love and enjoyment of music, and I wanted to understand and experience that.” Stein’s titles evoke that time and the shades of those now grown and gone. “Little Bird,” is for his little sister, and “Sammy’s Crayons,” is an homage to his half-brother’s childhood love of drawing.

In a fundamental way, these family circumstances and events have proven to be the catalyst for Stein’s current music. His move to Chicago precipitated many of the diverse working relationships he enjoys now, from his time in Ken Vandermark’s incendiary Bridge 61 to his minimal rock excursions with guitarist David Daniels. Three Kinds of Happiness is one important confluence of these seemingly disparate influences, and it places him and Locksmith Isidore in the pantheon of those who have the courage to go beyond mere mimicry and reach for the fluidity and flexibility of innovation.

RELEASE DATE: November 30, 2010

Press Quotes:

“[On Three Less Than Between] Stein’s strong tunes, which routinely dissolve the boundary between composition and improvisation, they do an excellent job switching from bristling swing to tangled outbursts of unmetered free jazz. It’s especially rewarding to listen to…”
- Peter Margasak, Chicago Reader

“As Stein subdivides and recombines his phrases, giving gleaming kisses to the reed, fluttering and finely twining closely-valued hues, it isn’t so much about putting an instrument through its paces as it is one artist’s affirmation of his relationship to the brush.”
- Clifford Allen, Signal Noise

“[Stein] plays pretty and raucous, taciturn and ebullient, bouncing confidently between a spectrum of emotions and dialects.”
- Derek Taylor, Master of a Small House

“..it is clear that Jason Stein has burst upon the scene as a player to be heard.”
- Grego Applegate Edwards, Gapplegate Music Review

Links:
Jason Stein Official Website
Jason Stein on Twitter

For more information, please contact
Matt Merewitz at Fully Altered Media
matt@fullyaltered.com
(215) 629-6155

CD RELEASE PERFORMANCE
@ Jazz Standard
October 26, 2010
(7:30 & 9:30pm)

Exclusive Album Preview & Online Press Kit:
Dan Tepfer Trio — Five Pedals Deep
(contact us for password)

Photo: Vincent Soyez

In his forthcoming trio release, Five Pedals Deep on Sunnyside Records, wildly inventive pianist Dan Tepfer plumbs the depths of conventional harmony, engaging pop modalities, minimalism, and jazz tradition with the audacity and irreverence of a deep-sea explorer. The 28-year-old, Brooklyn-based pianist has forged a richly layered collection of lyrical, immediately accessible compositions that upon repeated listenings reveal a nuanced scaffolding of atmospheric soundscapes beneath the surface.

Beyond the eclectic influence of such vanguard groups as indie rockers Dirty Projectors and electronica maven Aphex Twin, Tepfer drew much of his inspiration for the album from Thelonious Monk. “When you listen to Monk’s music, you can put it on for anybody, it doesn’t matter if they’re into jazz, and they love it,” says Tepfer. “The reason for that is that it’s got really strong melodies, there’s a real coherence to the sound, it grooves, and there’s a strong feeling of fun that comes through in the music. I think in many ways I’m trying to do a contemporary version of that.”

The album title originates from a bibulous evening Tepfer spent with a cousin. “We were at a party, and we’d drunk five bottles of wine, and she said something like, ‘You get pretty happy when you’re five bottles deep.’ What I heard was ‘five pedals deep,’ and I thought that was a beautiful way of expressing the feeling I often get when I’m playing, a feeling of being drunk on music,” says Tepfer. “A pedal is a long bass note that ties different harmonies together, and it’s one of my favorite musical devices.”

Tepfer features the deft interplay of two eminent musical contemporaries, bassist Thomas Morgan and drummer Ted Poor, a departure from his longtime collaboration with bassist Jorge Roeder and drummer Richie Barshay, his touring trio for the past six years.

“It’s like when you’ve been married for a long time,” says Tepfer. “You just know someone so well that even if you are completely improvising, you can still hear in your head how he’s going to react. With Thomas and Ted, there was none of that. I had no idea.”

The “sound of surprise” is evident throughout, the players never relying on reflexive facility as they navigate the varied terrains of Tepfer’s original compositions, mostly written over the past two years. This ranges from the minimalist ostinato of “All I Heard Was Nothing,” to the dense drum ’n bass-inspired rhythms of “Peal Repeal,” to the languorously dissonant beauty of “The Distance,” with four minute-long interludes serving as connective tissue. Tepfer’s visceral tie to the music cuts through in the wistfully nostalgic “Le Plat Pays,” Belgian troubadour Jacques Brel’s stirring homage to his homeland.

“Growing up in Paris, my first girlfriend was a huge Jacques Brel fan,” Tepfer says. “I just remember learning the lyrics and being so captivated by that tune in particular. There’s so much meaning contained in this appearance of simplicity.”

In his solo rendition of “Body and Soul,” Tepfer includes a subtle nod to mentor Lee Konitz, conspicuous by his absence, although Konitz’s influence is deeply felt. “Nobody plays ‘Body and Soul’ like Lee does,” Tepfer says. In 2009, he released a duo album with Konitz called Duos with Lee. “One thing that’s really come up for me in the last four years now, playing with Lee pretty regularly, is the integrity of melody. I feel sinful if a phrase doesn’t get resolved.”

Born to American parents, Tepfer spent his first 18 years in Paris, beginning classical piano studies at the Paris Conservatoire Paul Dukas at the age of six. He had improvisation in his blood, though, inherited from his grandfather, West Coast jazz pianist Chuck Ruff. With a fecund intellect that extends far beyond music theory, Tepfer went on to earn a bachelor’s degree in astrophysics from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, writing his undergraduate thesis on “Numerical Simulations of Galactic Superwinds.”

While in Scotland, he also played in the Edinburgh Jazz Festival and the International Fringe Festival, even conducting a production of Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Telphone. He later earned a master’s degree from the New England Conservatory in Boston, and has performed alongside legendary jazz musicians Steve Lacy, Paul Motian, Ralph Towner, and Billy Hart, among others.

Though at this point his passion for cosmology has taken a back seat to his musical career, it continues to inform his worldview. “I think the tone of my music reflects who I am, and who I am is somebody who is fascinated by the huge scale of the universe,” Tepfer says. “I love seeing myself on the earth from really far away, and I’m sure that comes out in the music somehow.”

Website:  http://www.dantepfer.com/
Twitter:  http://twitter.com/tepferdan

RELEASE DATE: OCTOBER 26, 2010

For more information, please contact
Matt Merewitz at Fully Altered Media
matt@fullyaltered.com
(215) 629-6155

It takes a minute for a band to hurdle growth spurts and become the eloquent ensemble it hopes to be. But striving for a truly individual sound, one that depends on the contributions of each member is a noble goal. After three years as a quintet with two saxophones up front, Blue Cranes have achieved such a victory. They prove it with Observatories.

On its third album, everything gels for the acclaimed instrumental outfit from Portland, Oregon. Working that thin line between prog-jazz improvisation and indie rock catchiness, the band arrives at a unique spot. Like forebears such as The Ordinaires and The President, and contemporaries like Todd Sickafoose’s Tiny Resistors and John Hollenbeck’s Claudia Quintet, Blue Cranes have found ways to make exploration seem like the most enjoyable process around.

The songs and performances on Observatories are all about rewards of collective articulation. Reed Wallsmith, the group’s straw boss, saxophonist and main composer, says the new album finds them putting their best foot forward.

“Homing Patterns, the record before this, was a quintet with two horns; Sly Pig joined us on tenor saxophone a year before we made it.  But, I had conceived of a lot of the music originally for quartet.  Since then, with more time under our belts, I think our compositions more fully incorporate all five of us.  For Observatories we wrote more contrapuntal lines, not just melodies and support riffs.  I hope that the entire group unity comes through. It feels great to hear it happen.”

Blue Cranes is comprised of drummer Ji Tanzer, bassist Keith Brush, keyboardist Rebecca Sanborn, tenor saxophonist Joe “Sly Pig” Cunningham, and Wallsmith himself. The alto saxophonist says that the camaraderie of gigging on the road has bolstered the band’s unity.

photo credit: Jason Quigley

“We’ve done seven tours now, and gone out for a week and a half at a time. That kind of continuity is such a great way to get tight as a band – performing every night and being able to talk about the music every day. We have fun on the road. Sharing music on iPods, hanging out, laughing about everything. It’s such a blast to get to know each other better. It’s not just my vision driving the action anymore; it’s all of ours – which has always been my goal.”

Blue Cranes’ music is refreshingly diverse. They may be a left-of-center instrumental outfit, but their book has lots of room for old-fashioned beauty. Wallsmith’s “Grandpa’s Hands” is a bittersweet anthem with a luminous theme that boasts echoes of Steve Reich. Cunningham’s “Broken Windmills” is an evocative lament that could easily snuggle up to an Ornette Coleman ballad. Waxing rustic isn’t forbidden with Blue Cranes, and that decision widens the record’s emotional palette. On “Yellow Ochre,” the group sounds like The Band sauntering its way through The Beatles’ “Let It Be.”

“Tim Young, the guitarist from Wayne Horvitz’s band, made a comment I liked,” says Wallsmith. “He said ‘You guys aren’t afraid to just play melodies.’ I think that’s true. ‘Yellow Ochre’ feels old fashioned to me. ‘Maddie Mae,’ too. I’m proud of that tone. But the album wouldn’t work if it was full of tunes like ‘Yellow Ochre.’ We wanted to make it flow, to have the pretty stuff move right into the in-your-face stuff.”

Indeed, Observatories does strike a balance between genteel and rambunctious. Crescendos crop up in all sorts of places, and the physical thrust of the rhythm section gives several moments a wonderfully vicious clout. “Richie Bros.” has an intricate pounding intro, a dreamy head, and an explosive middle. “We don’t get super mathy, but ‘Richie Bros.’ is aggressive,” Wallsmith concurs. “I like the power of it, but I also like the fact that it’s followed by the softness of ‘Maddie Mae.’

Sly Pig also played and recorded with indie rock superheroes, The Decemberists. It seems he and Wallsmith have found the perfect formula for cogent abstraction.

“From the first day we started playing, I felt unexpectedly in-synch with him,” says Wallsmith. “We started at an all-improvised gig, and when we played together, I had this feeling that we were long lost brothers.’ I’ve never really met another sax player who approaches music like me. Wherever we’re coming from, it’s a similar same place. We work as a team.”

The Blue Cranes have received kudos from a few key contemporaries. They’ve shared bills with keyboard icon Wayne Horvitz (his “Love Love Love” is part of Observatories) and he’s now a fan.  Wallsmith was a Happy Apple zealot when he was in college in Minneapolis and when drummer Dave King, now of The Bad Plus, posted a “don’t miss John Hollenbeck’s tour” missive on the The Bad Plus’ blog, Wallsmith made a point to catch the drummer-composer. “After the gig I gave someone at the venue a CD to give to John.  He later contacted me out of the blue to say that, although he didn’t expect to, he really liked it.  What an honor!”  Blue Cranes have since shared the stage with bands as diverse as Hollenbeck’s Claudia Quintet, the dub/hardcore Mi Ami, trumpeter Cuong Vu and violinist Michael White.

Ultimately Observatories is about breadth. Blue Cranes is a band that sees things from various perspectives. A toy piano is the first sound you hear on the disc; a baby’s voice is the final. Variety is central to the action. Tanzer is the go-to guy when it comes to album titles; he’s named the previous Blue Cranes albums. But it was the band’s friend and Tanzer’s band mate, Spinanes leader Rebecca Gates, who came up with the current moniker, and one thing’s for certain: Observatories is dead on, because the Blue Cranes are here to show us all sorts of things.

RELEASE DATE: SEPTEMBER 14, 2010

For more information, please contact Matt Merewitz at Fully Altered Media / (347) 527-2527 or matt@fullyaltered.com

In-Demand New York Drummer for Dave Binney, Rudresh Mahanthappa’s Indo-Pak Coalition, Vijay Iyer & Many Others

One of Five Drummers to Watch (and Hear)
According to NY Times Critic Ben Ratliff
Release Date: March 16, 2010

Album Features: Jacob Sacks & Thomas Morgan (+ Jack Lemmon cameo)

‘Timshel’, meaning ‘Thou Mayest,’ is a Hebrew word which challenges the traditional biblical phrase, ‘Thou Shalt.’ I came across this word as I read John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, and the idea behind the word was very inspiring to me. ‘Thou Mayest’ characterizes man as the maker of his own fate. We are all free to choose our own destiny. This gives us the innate power to create and to be creative.” – Dan Weiss, from the liner notes

The best drummers, like Art Blakey, Max Roach and Billy Higgins, don’t lead by propulsive pyrotechnics; rather, they lead by inspiring their fellow musicians to the heights of their musical plateaus. The endlessly inventive New York-born drummer, tabla player, and composer Dan Weiss, a seasoned veteran of the Manhattan jazz scene, as evidenced by his sterling sideman work with everybody from Lee Konitz, David Binney and Vijay Iyer, to Miguel Zenon, Uri Caine and Ben Monder, is such a drummer. Weiss, with the release of his Sunnyside debut, Timshel, signals the end of his anonymity.

Backed by his long-time trio mates, pianist Jacob Sacks and drummer Thomas Morgan, Weiss weaves elements of different compositional styles and knowledge of Indian rhythms into the language of jazz on his twelve-track CD, to create something new and eternal, foreign and familiar. “Each piece in this record draws upon a specific inspiration which has captured my curiosity and imagination the last couple of years,” Weiss writes in the liner notes. “The intention behind this record was to take the essence of each of these inspirations and to create a musical narrative. It is intended to be listened to as one piece, uninterrupted. While each piece is its own song, they each serve a larger purpose which is the suite.”

Weiss and his terrific triad offer a sensitive and sophisticated take on how a twenty-first century trio should sound. Weiss’ expert drumming soothes, swings, and flies, with Sacks’ elegiac pianism and Morgan’s steady and supportive bass lines. “Stephanie” dances with a Latin tinge, contrasted by the dark and lovely lullaby excursions of “Dream,” the title track “Timshel,” the Chopinesque “Frederic,” and the tabla-tantric “Teental Song.” “Florentino and Fermina,” two characters from Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s immortal novel, Love in the Time of Cholera, evolves from a sensuous tone poem to an urgent, 4/4 cadence. Weiss pays tribute to another extra-musical medium: film, with his ingenious “Always Be Closing,” which comes from a line from the film Glenngarry Glen Ross, starring Jack Lemmon, where Weiss’s devilish drum work mimics Lemmon’s dialog. “Dream” is a work that melds all of the CD’s myriad moods and grooves, while “Chakradar #4” and “Interlude” highlight Weiss’s expert adaptations of sub-continental Indian scales and tabla rhythms to jazz.

If it takes a village to raise a child, then it took a world city like New York to create a global musician like Dan Weiss. Born in New Jersey, Weiss started playing the drums at the age of six. Weiss attended Manhattan School of Music and studied drumset with John Riley, composition with David Noon and frame drums with Jamey Haddad. Weiss has studied the tabla for twelve years under the guidance of his guru, Pandit Samir Chatterjee, and has performed classical Indian music with Ramesh Mishra, Mandira Lahiri, Subra Guha, Anoushka Shankar, Anirban Dasgupta, Joyas Biswas, and Steve Gorn. He has also performed in recitals with his teacher in Kolkata, India. His two previous recordings as a leader: Tintal Drumset Solo (Chhandayan, 2005) and Now Yes When (Toap, 2006).

So, from drumkits to tablas, as Timshel aurally illustrates in all of it’s syncopated splendor, that Dan Weiss has got the rhythms covered. “I feel grateful to have been exposed to such beautiful things, and I feel even more grateful for the opportunity to now share these things with you.”

Dan Weiss’ Official Website

Dan Weiss Trio on MySpace

For more information, please contact
Matt Merewitz at Fully Altered Media
matt@fullyaltered.com
347-527-2527 (office)

The highly anticipated New York debut of Sam Sadigursky’s Words Project III: Miniatures, the NY-based saxophonist and composer’s third installment in the critically acclaimed Words Project series on New Amsterdam Records, will take place Friday January 29th at Galapagos Art Space in DUMBO (16 Main St. at the corner of Water St and Main St. Brooklyn, NY 11201) as part of New Amsterdam’s ARCHIPELAGO Series. These releases mix modern and post-modern poetry with Sadigursky’s unique compositional vision that draws stylistically from both jazz and new music. Source material includes poems by Emily Dickinson, Carl Sandburg, Maxim Gorky, Léon de Greiff and William Carlos Williams sung by a range of New York-based vocalists including Michael Leonhart, Monika Heidemann, Becca Stevens, Heather Masse and Matt Kanelos.

Here’s what Sam has to say in his own words (from the Naxos blog at Sequenza21.com).

Here’s what the critics are already saying about Words Project III:

The highly respected veteran jazz journalist Doug Ramsey writes on his ArtsJournal blog, Rifftides:

“As we pointed out in a Rifftides posting two years ago today, jazz and poetry never really became a movement. Over the past 90 years or so, the hybridform has had a few peak periods and some embarrassing lows. On the strength of Sam Sadigursky’s work, we may be at one of the peaks.”

Fort Worth Weekly music scribe Ken Shimamoto captures the difference between Words Project III and other poetry-jazz hybrids.

“It would be wrong to call Words Project III: Miniatures a “poetry-jazz” record. To many folks, that description evokes a ’50s movie cliché of goateed beret-and-turtleneck wearers in a smoky basement, snapping their fingers to signify approval of some “Howl”-era Ginsberg caricature backed by stale bebop. What New York-based composer Sam Sadigursky’s up to here is something entirely other. The phrase that pays is “art song.” The record is as redolent of classical music as it is of jazz, while the vocalists’ delivery and Sadigursky’s setting produce a resolutely contemporary sound.“

Friday January 29th
8:00 PM – one set

Sam Sadigursky’s Words Project III: Miniatures Premiere/Release Party
New Amsterdam Records’ ARCHIPELAO Series

Galapagos Art Space
16 Main St. (corner of Water and Main)
Brooklyn, NY 11201 (DUMBO)

Personnel:
Monika Heidemann, Becca Stevens, Heather Masse, Michael Leonhart, Matt Kanelos – voice
Sam Sadigursky – saxophones
Pete Rende – piano, accordion
Nate Radley – guitar
Gary Wang – bass
Richie Barshay – drums/percussion

Sam Sadigursky’s website
Sam Sadigursky’s MySpace page
Sam Sadigursky’s Facebook Fan Page
New Amsterdam Records
Galapagos Art Space

For more information, please contact Matt Merewitz at Fully Altered Media / 347-527-2527 or 215-629-6155 / matt@fullyaltered.com

See what the Times critics had to say about their work:

Ben Allison Album Preview

BEN ALLISON The brave commingling of progressive jazz and indie-rock continues apace on “Think Free,” the new album from this ever-shrewd bassist and composer. He has good people for the job: the guitarist Steve Cardenas, the trumpeter Shane Endsley, the violinist Jenny Scheinman and the drummer Rudy Royston. Oct. 13. Palmetto. (Nate Chinen)

Ben Ratliff on Vijay Iyer’s new album, Historicity (ACT Music)

VIJAY IYER’S piano trio sneaked up on listeners when they weren’t really paying much attention to it. It was there in some of the best parts of Mr. Iyer’s impressive recent quartet album, “Tragicomic” (Sunnyside), that don’t include the group’s saxophonist, Rudresh Mahanthappa; it surfaced in occasional gigs or commissions over the past four years for the band’s three other musicians, the pianist Mr. Iyer, the bassist Stephan Crump and the drummer Marcus Gilmore. But “Historicity,” to be released on Oct. 13 by the German label ACT, is piano-bass-drums from beginning to end, and so it’s probably the moment to say: Presto! Here is the great new jazz piano trio.

The new music by this New York pianist, 38, is just as quick coursing and strict rhythm dodging as the rest of his work back to the mid-1990s. (He loves working with long, percussive piano vamps in odd time signatures, and Mr. Gilmore can make them dance and stagger.) But here the result is sleeker, more stylish and tuneful, powerful without unnecessary bulk.

It’s also Mr. Iyer’s first serious attempt at a repertory album, dotted with other people’s songs, including M.I.A.’s “Galang,” Andrew Hill’s “Smoke Stack,” Leonard Bernstein’s “Somewhere” (from “West Side Story”), Stevie Wonder’s “Big Brother” and Ronnie Foster’s “Mystic Brew.”

In a highly functioning jazz-piano trio playing original music, Mr. Iyer explained in a recent conversation, “everyone is contributing structural information.” In other words, “you’re not just playing over something: you are that something at the same time.” The next step, then, was to work with other people’s structures and see if the principle held.

None of the covers on the new album were written for piano trio, and that alone would legitimize a lot of overhaul. But Mr. Iyer doesn’t go coy or perverse. Through the band’s own interactive arrangements you can hear the melody of each song, and its intended mood too. (With “Big Brother,” full of Mr. Crump’s ominous bowed bass, Mr. Iyer took special care, because when you play it without words, he said, “you forget that it’s a really dark song.”)

Mr. Iyer talks about the “disruptive” quality of the songs he covers, and by that he means the questioning spirit of the music that he identifies with as a listener. With one exception.

“I don’t think ‘Somewhere’ has a disruptive quality,” he allowed. “But if Coltrane can do ‘My Favorite Things,’ I can do ‘Somewhere.’ ”

A version of this article appeared in print on September 13, 2009, on page AR64 of the New York edition.

Related content:
Official Web site, with music streams: Vijay Iyer
Video: Galang (YouTube)

Release Date: October 6, 2009

The title of Linda Oh‘s debut CD, Entry, describes not only her emergence as a leader, but her arrival amongst the ranks of bassists who step out of the sidelines into the spotlight with a strong, cohesive vision. Alongside Ambrose Akinmusire on trumpet and drummer Obed Calvaire, Oh offers a compelling three-way conversation in which she serves as both equal voice and steely anchor.

“So many musicians want to do everything with their first album,” Oh says. “Especially bass players who play upright and electric — Here’s me doing a funk tune, here’s me doing a swing tune…I wanted to steer completely clear of that and have something kind of raw as well as challenging. Basically, I knew I wanted to do something different.”

Though she achieves that goal musically throughout Entry, Oh’s backstory alone ensures her uniqueness, even on the globally-oriented New York scene. Born in Malaysia to Chinese parents and raised in Western Australia, she arrived in NYC three years ago having followed a circuitous route, culturally and musically.

Starting with classical piano lessons at age four, Oh’s musical dabblings progressed through various woodwind instruments throughout her school years before settling on the bassoon during high school. But at the same time, an uncle gave her an electric bass, which she played by day in her school jazz band at night, emulating Flea on Red Hot Chili Peppers covers by night.

Oh’s musical tastes had been forged through the influence of her older sister, who introduced her to “everything from the Red Hot Chili Peppers to Faith No More to Fela Kuti to Jaco Pastorius.” That influence persists on Entry via the trio’s hushed, tender version of the Chili Pepper’ early-90s B-side, “Soul to Squeeze”, which closes the album.

Having split her attentions between bassoon and bass throughout high school, the time came to make a choice when Oh decided to further her studies. She settled on the bass and in 2002 was accepted into the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts, where she began playing the upright bass for the first time.

“Being brought up in Australia, especially in such an isolated, pretty town as Perth, there were some very amazing, incredibly underrated musicians,” Oh says. “And because Australia is so small, I find it to be brutally honest. Here, I see a lot of people getting by because they have the right publicist or the right look, but over there people are a bit more willing to say, ‘This sounds like crap.’ That was a huge influence on me because it made me really learn fast.”

When it came time to record her own debut as a leader, Oh decided to assemble a stripped-down trio for a darker, moodier sound. “The dark blue color that I chose for the album cover reflects what I felt the colors of the tunes were,” she says. “It’s kind of strange, but I was looking for something a bit more honest. I wanted it to have a darker sound, so I had to constantly tell Ambrose to aim lower than what he would usually aim for.”

Oh chose two of New York’s most innovative talents for her trio, both fellow Manhattan School grads. Akinmusire has followed his victory in the 2007 Thelonious Monk International Jazz Competition by playing with legends like Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter. Calvaire lists Wynton Marsalis, Danilo Perez, Stefon Harris, and a two-year stint with Steve Turre on his résumé.

The three make for a formidable unit, maintaining a taut electricity while volleying ideas between them at the speed of inspiration. “I wanted the melodies and the harmonies to be simple and direct to create that raw sound,” Oh says. “Everything else — the rhythms, the ideas — could go wherever they wanted to. Basically, I was looking to put together my own tunes in the way that I wanted to, while giving the other guys the freedom to really characterize them.”

That combination of edge and electricity is present right out of the gate, in the tense pulse of “Morning Sunset”, met initially with smears and chirps from Akinmusire’s horn before building in momentum, with that throbbing heartbeat maintained throughout, traded among the instrumentalists.

It’s also present in the nervous energy of Oh’s opening bass lines on “Fourth Limb”, accompanied by Calvaire’s equally caffeinated chattering percussion, soothed by the entrance of a calmingly soulful trumpet melody.

Despite Oh’s focus on dark colors and raw sounds, there is no shortage of beauty on the album, whether in the form of Akinmusire’s chorus-like fanfare at the outset of “Numero Uno” or the bop-funk head of “Gunners”, which hides a punk snarl inside.

It’s not quite accurate to call this a three-sided dialogue, however — by devising clever tunes with built-in space for constant reinvention, Oh offers a suite of tunes that reward the listener who digs into the spaces that the trio carves out. In that sense, it’s a cooperative effort that works via four minds converging.

For more information, contact Matt Merewitz (matt@fullyaltered.com / 215-629-6155)

Bassist/composer Ben Allison‘s ninth album, Think Free, is part of a paradigm shift that began with his 2005 Palmetto Records release, Cowboy Justice. “I wanted a band that rocked,” says Allison of his changing sound. “I was moving away from the chamber-jazz elements of Medicine Wheel and Peace Pipe and trying to incorporate other sounds into my music. I continue to try to get to something personal. Cowboy Justice, Little Things Run the World (Palmetto, 2008), and now Think Free are all one continuous train of thought.”

Think Free builds not only on the concept but also the personnel of its predecessors. Longtime compatriot Steve Cardenas returns on guitar, alongside trumpeter Shane Endsley, violinist Jenny Scheinman and drummer Rudy Royston. Each of them are composers and band leaders and bear impressive artistic résumés: Cardenas is a member of Paul Motian’s Sextet and Charlie Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra; Endsley is a rising voice on trumpet, well known for his work in Kneebody and alongside Ani Difranco; Scheinman has been widely acclaimed for her performance as both violinist and vocalist; and Royston’s training in both the conservatory and the church contributes to his soulful precision behind the kit. The addition of Scheinman’s violin to the quartet of trumpet, guitar, bass and drums had been in Allison’s mind since 2005. “In the past few years I was fortunate to play a lot with Jenny, often in collaboration with Rudy and Steve. We all felt an immediate and strong musical connection.” Allison continues, “I think an extremely important part of being a composer/bandleader is assembling an interesting combination of musicians. Duke Ellington and Miles Davis were masters of this. Their music is very much an extension of the rapport between, and personalities of, the members of their groups. It could be said that choosing the right musicians is part of the compositional process.”

As on past records, Think Free is comprised of Allison originals both new and old. “Fred” wears its compelling simplicity on its sleeve, both musically and in its title given by Allison’s five-year-old daughter. Scheinman turns in an outstanding solo over the rocking groove provided by Allison and Royston. Her violin blends with Endsley’s round trumpet tone on the spacious head of “Platypus,” with Cardenas’ arpeggios churning underneath. Of his solo on Platypus, Steve Cardenas says “Ben asked me to play long tones, kind of an ‘anti-solo’. It’s amazing the way the 7/4 time feel just disappears.” The tune is named in honor of Charles Darwin, whose bicentennial passed while Allison was writing music for the album. “Broke” brings to mind, for Allison, the rusted tractors along the rural routes of Missouri, with a gentle lilt and melancholy delivered by muted trumpet and violin. Cardenas’ pulsing chords open “Kramer vs. Kramer vs. Godzilla” (a reference for Spinal Tap fans) before Allison and Royston join the party with a wallop of a backbeat. Endsley uncorks some moog-mangled trumpet, to which Scheinman responds with scratchy bowing and simulated feedback. “…vs. Godzilla” is an improvised miniature based on the same piece. Royston’s toms add an ominous undertone to Endsley’s Harmon-muted ostinato.

Longtime fans of Allison will recognize the rest of the repertoire: “Sleeping Giant” is the new metamorphosis of “R&B Fantasy” from Buzz (Palmetto, 2004), which juxtaposes the chamber-jazz tendencies of Allison’s earlier work with his new direction towards direct, rocking simplicity. “Green Al,” originally from the same album, is now dedicated to Gore in lieu of Green. “Peace Pipe,” from that band’s eponymous 2002 record, re-appears as well. “Re-interpreting one’s own music is a big part of the jazz tradition,” Allison says. “Like Monk when he was in his mid-career, I’ve probably written about 50 tunes. As my groups change, it’s always interesting to me to hear the ways in which a particular group of musicians deals with a tune. Different instrumentations always inspire me to rearrange material in novel ways.” This is evident most effectively on “Peace Pipe,” where Allison, Cardenas, and Scheinman combine to emulate Mamadou Diabaté’s kora from the original recording. Allison states, “My music is in flux.”

Think Free presents the latest phase of his promising and riveting evolution in the company of brilliant musical allies.

The album will be launched at NYC’s Jazz Standard (116 E. 27th Street), October 16-18, 2009.

For more information, contact Matt Merewitz (matt@fullyaltered.com / 215-629-6155)