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Christian McBride contemporary jazz Conversations with Christian jazz Mack Avenue Records music releases United States

Bassist Christian McBride teams up with others on CD “Conversations with Christian”

On his eight CDs that precede Conversations With Christian, bassist Christian McBride has framed himself in ensemble contexts, most recently on the widely lauded 2009 Mack Avenue release Kind of Brown, which showcases the Inside Straight quintet (his return to the acoustic jazz format as a leader) and The Good Feeling, released in September, comprising a suite of well-wrought charts for an A-list 17-piece big band.

Although McBride’s leader and sideman c.v. includes no small number of pungent duos with various game-changers — to name two, McCoy Tyner and Jim Hall — he has heretofore refrained from devoting an entire recording to the genre. That discographical gap is now rectified with Conversations with Christian, on which the 39-year-old maestro places himself in the forefront of the flow on a duet apiece with “13 of my closest musical friends and cohorts”– singers Angélique Kidjo, Sting and Dee Dee Bridgewater; pianists George Duke, Eddie Palmieri and Chick Corea, as well as Dr. Billy Taylor and Hank Jones (who both passed away in 2010); violinist Regina Carter; trumpeter Roy Hargrove; guitarist Russell Malone; tenor saxophonist Ron Blake; and actress Gina Gershon. In the process, McBride unleashes the full measure of his already legendary skills, crafting as complete a portrait of his diverse interests-different vibrations of the blues and African-American church experience, bebop, the American Songbook, the Latin Tinge, the Freedom Principle, even comedy-as he has ever presented.

“I love and appreciate so many different styles and cultures,” he said in a news release. “Changing hats, going from one project to another, from a straight-ahead session to an R&B session to a pop session, has always fueled my activity. I try to put all those different sounds into one pot and make it a coherent, jazz-inflected sound.”

McBride first considered a proposal to do a duet project during the latter ’90s, when he was signed to Verve. “At the time,” he recalls, “I didn’t feel I was ready, or that it was the project I wanted to do. I had other things in mind. But as time progressed, I got to do other projects-putting together the Christian McBride Band and experimenting with a lot of different sounds and layers-and my focus returned to the duets idea.”

This renewed interest coincided with McBride’s involvement with the National Jazz Museum In Harlem (he is co-director), where he launched a still ongoing series of public talks and interviews. “My manager, Andre Guess, and my wife, Melissa Walker, noticed that I had a good rapport with almost everyone I interviewed,” recalls McBride, whose warmth comes through as palpably in conversation as in notes and tones. “They both suggested that it might be time.”

In conjunction with the project, McBride conducted videotaped interviews with each participant. Available as discrete podcasts since 2009, this series eventually led to the popular Sirius-XM radio show, The Lowdown: Conversations With Christian.

“I think the duet is a logical extension of the nature of the bass itself,” McBride says. “It’s the root. Joe Zawinul once stated that the drums are the father of all music, and the bass is the mother. I had a hard time disagreeing. The bass has the rhythm and the pulse, and also the notes and harmonies. That would seem to make it the ideal instrument for any sort of duet.”

The operative principle throughout is McBride’s dictum, “Most of what I enjoy doing is based in, around, and upon the groove; I want to hold down the fort, but have the ability to visit the roof if I want.” Conversations With Christian will assume its place as a masterpiece of the duo idiom.



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Christmas contemporary jazz Geri Allen gospel jazz Motema Records music releases United States

Pianist Geri Allen shares a collection of music on new CD “A Child is Born”

Despite its time-honored traditions and universally familiar iconography, Christmas remains a holiday celebrated by each family and even each individual in their own personal style. Pianist/composer Geri Allen offers her own interpretation with A Child Is Born, a collection of traditional and original Christmas music that is profound and exuberant, solemn and joyous, spiritual and intimate.


Allen’s third release for Motéma Music is a solo sequel to her critically acclaimed solo debut, 2010’s Flying Toward the Sound. Where that release paid tribute to three of her creative inspirations – Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner, and Cecil Taylor – A Child Is Born honors equally meaningful but perhaps even more deeply entrenched influences: family and spirituality. She refers to the album as “a joyous Christmas celebration and remembrance of a childhood where love was always unconditional.”
Geri Allen
This holiday offering finds Allen at a particularly celebratory time of life. Her tandem 2010 releases on Motéma, the solo, Flying Toward the Sound, and the quartet, Timeline Live, have shown her to be at the top of her game, gaining unanimous acclaim internationally and jostling with each other for space on numerous year-end top ten lists. A 2008 Guggenheim Fellowship helped Allen facilitate her debut solo project on Motéma; and Timeline Live, which features the startlingly talented Maurice Chestnut on ‘tap-percussion,’ has been selling out houses world wide and garnered a career first for Allen: an NAACP Image Award nomination for Outstanding Jazz Album, alongside Herbie Hancock, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Wynton Marsalis, and Bobby McFerrin. National respect for Allen as a virtuosic, innovative performer, composer, and educator (she is currently an Associate Professor of Jazz and Contemporary Improvisation at the University of Michigan) is undeniable, as evidenced by two powerful recent honors of 2011. She was invited to perform in honor of the historic Dr. Martin Luther King Monument Unveiling this August in Washington D.C.
A Child Is Born is dedicated to Allen’s family, in particular to her father, Mount Allen, Jr. and mother, Barbara Jean Allen. 
“I am privileged and blessed to have grown up as the child of Barbara Jean and Mount Vernell Allen, Jr.,” she says in a recent news release. “I know God loved me because He gave them to my brother Mount and I. Memories of many loving Christmases with family remain as affirmations of the beauty of life and God’s never-ending love. Today, I share these timeless melodies and personal remembrances with my own children.”
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Biophilia Records contemporary jazz Cuba Fabian Almazan iTunes jazz music releases United States

Cuban pianist/composer Fabian Almazan releases his debut album “Personalities”

Fabian Almazan‘s debut, Personalities (Biophilia Records), reveals his penchant for musical storytelling with well-crafted originals and well-chosen covers. Born in Cuba, raised in Miami and based in New York City, the pianist and composer, 27, has apprenticed with Terence Blanchard and is a recent fellow of the Sundance Film Composer’s Lab.
iTunes has announced they will feature the track “The Vicarious Life” from Personalities as a weekly iTunes Discovery Download. This is remarkable not only because this is Almazan’s debut recording, but because it is very rare for instrumental jazz to be given such a wide platform.
Almazan’s trio is comprised of bassist Linda Oh and drummer Henry Cole, both Manhattan School of Music classmates. 
“They are both very open-minded musicians with a fearless ability to turn on a dime if the music takes a different direction,” Almazan says in a news release. “Needless to say, they have profound command over their respective instruments.” The trio is augmented by a string quartet featuring violinists Meg Okura and Megan Gould, violist Karen Waltuch and cellist Noah Hoffeld.
True to the album title, the music is about people that have impacted Almazan’s life so far. The inspirations for his compositions range from tributes to his grandmothers and mother (“Grandmother Song,” “Una Foto”), overheard conversations about atheism (“Sin Alma”), stage parents at adolescent piano recitals (“The Vicarious Life”) and socio-economic reflections (“H.U.Gs”). About the latter, a tune that finds Almazan unravelling lines on Fender Rhodes, he says, “‘H.U.Gs’ stands for Historically Under-represented Groups. As I understand the acronym, it is used in scientific papers that deal with the environmental conditions in lower socio-economic communities. I wanted to write something that would embody the struggle that generations of abused and manipulated people have had to overcome to achieve equality.”
The evocative narratives on Personalities reflect Almazan’s self-described “international citizen” worldview, as well as his work as a film composer. His relationship to music can be summed up thusly: “I have learned that music has an uncomplicated purpose, which is to make you feel something. There are an endless amount of options on how to achieve that simple purpose.” 


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DVD gospel music releases Shekinah Glory Ministry United States

New Shekinah Glory Ministry film debuts at No. 4 on Billboard Chart

Shekinah Glory Ministry

According to a news release, the RIAA certified platinum-selling praise-and-worship ensemble, Shekinah Glory Ministry’s (SGM) new concert film  “Refreshed by Fire”  has debuted at No. 4 on Nielsen Soundscan’s Top Christian Music Videos chart and No. 11 on the Top Music video charts, sandwiched between a new Jimi Hendrix DVD and Beyonce’s “I Am the World” video. The much-anticipated concert film is a companion to last year’s No. 1 live double CD, “Refreshed by Fire.” Filmmaker Joel Kapity recorded the elaborate concert before a SRO crowd of 3,000 at Shekinah Glory Ministry’s Chicago area home church, Valley Kingdom Ministries International. 
With divine pomp and circumstance, the reel showcases emotion-packed singing from a variety of virtuoso vocalists covering rock-edged music and dance rhythms to quiet melodies, dramatic stage lighting, colorful banners and the synchronized praise dancing that have made the ensemble’s programs a fan favorite for the last decade. One particular highlight is the nearly 15 minute “The Minstrel’s Release” segment that showcases a lone dancer telling a story of a Biblical battle through her gestures as a guitarist’s strings illuminate the tale while a graphic artist paints a picture of the victor on the spot that is revealed at the end of the suite to rousing applause from the congregation.
The DVD is rounded out with behind-the-scenes footage and commentary on the ministry’s evolution that helps explain what has led to Shekinah Glory Ministry’s top ten hits such as “Praise is What I Do” and “Yes.”


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contemporary jazz Marsalis Music Miguel Zenon music Puerto Rico releases United States world world music

Grammy-nominated MacArthur fellow and saxophonist-composer Miguel Zenón releases his fifth album

Miguel Zenon

In Alma Adentro: The Puerto Rican Songbook (Marsalis Music), saxophonist, composer and arranger Miguel Zenón brings that jazz tradition home – his home.
The album is comprised of 10 pieces, two each by Bobby Capó, Tite Curet Alonso, Pedro Flores, Rafael Hernández, and Sylvia Rexach, who Zenón refers to as “the George Gershwins, Cole Porters and Jerome Kerns of Puerto Rican song,” and it features his regular quartet augmented by a 10-piece wind ensemble. The music was arranged by Zenón and orchestrated by Argentine pianist, composer and arranger Guillermo Klein.
“This project grew out of my interest in exploring the history and development of The Puerto Rican song,” says Zenón in a news release. “… I started focusing on the similar characteristics between The Puerto Rican Songbook and The Great American Songbook, not only musically, but also in terms of cultural impact. From there on, the project started to take shape.”
Zenón has explored his musical heritage previously in albums such as Jibaro (2005), in which he revisited the country music of Puerto Rico, and last year’s Esta Plena, in which he reinterpreted the traditional plena style.
“These are songs I know well because either my parents listened to them or they were very popular when I was a kid, so I grew up listening to them,”  he says and, he notes, he’s not alone. “We have been playing some of these songs with the quartet for awhile, and after every concert we have people who come to tell us ‘You know, my mom used to listen to that song on the radio…’ or  ‘I used to hear that song when I was younger…’.”
But in Alma Adentro the subject is popular song  – and it transcends regionalisms.The wind ensemble and Zenón’s core quartet – Luis Perdomo, piano; Hans Glawischnig, bass; and Henry Cole, drums – were recorded in the same room, live. 
“Very often when I play this type of material I’m thinking about the lyrics to the song,” he says. “In this case these are songs I know well so it’s actually difficult for me not to think about the lyrics. But eventually, you internalize the words and make it more your own, then it becomes something much more personal.”
Remaking popular songs is part of the stock in trade of a jazz musician, but Alma Adentro was a profoundly different experience for Zenón. 
“This was not just about melodies and harmonies,” he says. “There was a deeper, more emotional connection here. I grew up with these songs and they all had a very special and lasting effect on me.”

 

 

 

 


 

 


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jazz Jazz Legacy Productions music releases Tim Mayer United States

Saxophonist Tim Mayer to release “Resilience” on Sept. 27, 2011

According to a news release, Tim Mayer, ace tenor saxophonist, composer and arranger, will release Resilience on Jazz Legacy Productions on Sept. 27, 2011.
While not his maiden voyage, Mayer has recorded extensively as a sideperson, Resilience is Mayer’s debut as a leader and first disc for Jazz Legacy Productions. It would be easy (and typical) to record an album of readily recognizable standards, but Mayer struck a balance between ambition and user-friendliness. With a core quartet of Mayer, pianist George Cables, bassist Dezron Douglas, and drummer Willie Jones III, plus a select group of guests (Claudio Roditi, Mark Whitfield), Mayer’s platter swings from the get-go. A few tracks have additional players for a richer sound-a bit plush, a hair away from lush, with thoughtful yet vigorous arrangements in the vein of Tadd Dameron, Don Sebesky, and pre-1965 Gil Evans.
Tim Mayer’s horizons have grown exponentially. He has performed locally with Jon Faddis, Nick Brignola, Slide Hampton, and Bob Mintzer. He expanded his scope to include Afro-Cuban/Latin jazz styles, playing with Horacio “El Negro” Hernandez, Giovani Hidalgo, and Danilo Perez. Done with Berklee in 1997, Mayer joined Sol Y Canto, a folklorico-oriented Boston-area band that he’s performed with sporadically ever since. More recently, with his band 5LMN2 (Los Cinco Elementos), Mayer still explores the area(s) where jazz and Afro-Cuban sounds overlap and coalesce. Another venture, Gonzalo Grau y La Clave Secreta (formerly known as Timba Loca) released Frutero Moderno, which earned a Grammy nomination for Best Tropical/Latin Album. Another avenue of expression is his appreciation of exotica, which is evinced by his membership in the Waitiki 7. Mayer and Randy Wong produced two Hawaii Music Award winning albums for the group – New Sounds of Exotica (2010) received Adult Contemporary Album of the Year and Adventures in Paradise (2009) won Exotica Album of the Year. Contrary to the purist line of thinking, a human does not live by jazz alone. As if that weren’t enough, Mayer has an extensive resume in the sphere of Cape Verdean folk and pop, playing on albums by Bana, the Mendes Brothers, and Jack Pina.
In the great kitchen that is jazz, Mayer has notions waiting to be realized and served up in style. Realizing it’s not enough to simply cook well, Mayer knows how to present a savory meal. Compositionally, his stove is stoked by the blazing heat of hard bop trumpet icon Lee Morgan.
“Everything he played was solidly rooted in the blues,” Mayer said in a news release. Band-wise, his ideal is Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers. (Think of Blakey as “restaurateur” whose kitchens are perhaps the finest proving grounds for chefs of the future.) With those muses, it’s no wonder the varied and tangy Resilience has the zing and gusto of a fine repast, one that leaves the listener with a cozy afterglow.

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Black Smoke Music Worldwide/EPM Earnest Pugh gospel music releases United States

Vocalist Earnest Pugh climbs to #2 on Billboard Hot Gospel Songs Chart with radio single “I Need Your Glory”

Earnest Pugh

Gospel music artists Earnest Pugh, has placed four songs on the Billboard Hot Gospel Songs chart over the last two years, including his No. 1 single in 2009 “Rain on Us.”  Now, Pugh is poised to take the top slot again as his current radio hit “I Need Your Glory” climbs to #2 on next week’s Billboard Hot Gospel Songs chart.
Pugh’s latest CD, Earnestly Yours (Black Smoke Music Worldwide/EPM), recently debuted at #1 on Billboard’s Top Gospel Albums chart for two weeks. 
Pugh, a Memphis native (now living in the Washington, D.C. area) who was mentored by the late gospel great O’Landa Draper (who’s choir The Associates backed Billy Joel on his “River of Dreams” video in 1993), released his first solo CD in 2006 and showed off his five-octave vocals on the radio hit “Wrapped Up, Tied Up, Tangled Up.” After years of making respectable forays into gospel, Pugh finally hit it big in 2009 with “Rain on Us.” For more information, go to www.earnestpugh.com or www.mrkerrydouglas.com.






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Christian McBride jazz Mack Avenue Records releases United States

Bassist Christian McBride to release project featuring big band on Sept. 27, 2011

Bassist Christian McBride reaches another milestone with the release of The Good Feeling, his first big band recording as a leader and newest release for Mack Avenue Records, on Sept. 27. For over 20 years, McBride has appeared in numerous musical settings with just about any musician imaginable in the jazz as well as R&B and pop worlds. From playing with the likes of Milt Jackson, Roy Haynes, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock and Pat Metheny; to playing with and/or arranging for the likes of Isaac Hayes, Chaka Khan, Lalah Hathaway, Sting and the legendary James Brown, what has always been unique about McBride is his versatility. In addition to his work in the neo-soul arena with The Roots, D’Angelo, Queen Latifah and others, the Philadelphia native has also led his own ensembles: The Christian McBride Band, A Christian McBride Situation and his most recent group, Inside Straight (fresh off their critically acclaimed 2009 effort, Kind of Brown). There are many sides to the musical persona of Christian McBride, and The Good Feeling has him realizing another one: as the leader, arranger and conductor of his big band.
McBride’s first foray into the world of big band composing and arranging dates back to 1995, when he was commissioned by Jazz At Lincoln Center to write Bluesin’ in Alphabet City, featured on The Good Feeling and originally debuted by Wynton Marsalis & The Jazz At Lincoln Center Orchestra. Since that time he has composed a number of pieces for larger ensembles including The Movement Revisited, a five movement suite dedicated to four of the major figures of the civil rights movement: Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Putting a big band together is no easy task, but in this particular band, McBride feels fortunate to work with some of the most talented musicians in the jazz world. For his part, McBride feels that this process turned out the way he had hoped, with many musicians involved with whose work he is particularly familiar.
“[Trumpeter] Freddie Hendrix is one of the flagship guys in the big band, as is Frank Greene, along with trombonists Michael Dease and Steve Davis. (Steve and I go way back. He was one of my first calls). And the saxophone section was kind of a no brainer – Steve Wilson and Ron Blake – who have been the saxophonists in my last two working bands. I had to have those guys,” McBride says in a news release. “Now, one thing that seems to be my ‘Achilles heel’ with any band that I’ve had during my career is the piano chair, simply because everyone’s working all the time. But the X-Man, Xavier Davis, came in and did such a fantastic job.”
McBride’s interest in writing and arranging with a performer in mind is a trait that has been integral to the success of many great leaders of large ensembles, the most notable being the Duke Ellington Orchestra, with Ellington writing for specific musicians. McBride believes that philosophy works in his big band as well.
“Once you get the guys that you want, then you can write and arrange accordingly,” McBride said. “I’ve done that with all of my small groups. With the big band material, I had Steve Wilson in mind for Brother Mister; you’ve got Shake ‘n Blake that I wrote for Ron Blake. That song actually started out as a duo between he and I, but I thought it would work well for big band, so I just took the time to expand it; I just thought that song would be perfect for him. And I’m already hearing material that would be specifically suited for Michael Dease in the future. I think that’s what all the great band leaders have done – write music with the guys that you have in your band in mind. Because you know what will work.”


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jazz Kyle Eastwood performances releases Rendezvous Music world

Bassist Kyle Eastwood to release “Songs from the Chateau” on Aug. 30 on

These days, Kyle Eastwood is less and less known as the son of Clint Eastwood and more of a universally respected musician and leader in his own right. A virtuoso bassist on electric and upright, as well as a talented composer with a keen ear for great tunes and the subtleties of modern jazz, he is right at the forefront of the contemporary scene, having chosen to immerse himself in the music he loves. Dynamic and pulsing, full of swing, great rhythms and memorable melodies, Songs from the Chateau is Eastwood’s fourth U.S. effort on Rendezvous Music (licensed from Candid Records – one of the leading independent jazz labels in the UK). 


When he is not on tour, Eastwood spends much of his time between Paris, where he has lived on and off for five years, and Los Angeles and is very much at home in France; Eastwood’s preceding release on Rendezvous, Metropolitain, was also recorded in France, so it was natural to look there for an ideal place where he and his musicians could relax for a few days and allow their creative juices to flow. Such a place turned out to be the fabulous 15th Century Couronneau in Ligueux, deep in classic Bordeaux country, and Songs from the Chateau was born. To capture the authentic sound of the all-star band Eastwood has on display, producer Crofton Orr and the engineering of Simone Griva were enlisted. Also on board was long time collaborator Michael Stevens (cowriter with Eastwood on the scores for films including “Changeling” and “Gran Torino”).

Although it was recorded in Bordeaux, most of the record was written on the road and at rehearsals while Eastwood and his band were on tour in the spring and summer of 2010. As the tour progressed, so did arrangements and concepts for the album. By the time they got to recording at Chateau Couronneau, the band was already very comfortable with the music and was free to let the beautiful setting inspire them.

Eastwood said in a news release, “The whole idea of the project was to have a little break after the tour was over and take our time and record in a very relaxed way. We went in and recorded the way we would usually play a gig and I think this album really captures the way this band plays and interacts musically in a live setting.”

There’s a simple explanation as to why this group meshes so well together. Eastwood has been carefully developing this band for years; the most recent addition to the group has already been with the band for four years. “Some of my favorite albums in jazz were made by musicians who stayed together and developed this kind of group feeling and that is something that has always been important to me,” he said.

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Concord Jazz jazz releases Terri Lyne Carrington The Mosaic Project United States

Producer/Composer Terri Lyne Carrington releases The Mosaic Project on Concord Jazz

According to a news release, Hebert-Carrington Media co-founder Terri Lyne Carrington has released her visionary musical odyssey entitled The Mosaic Project (Carrington’s fifth album overall and her first on Concord Jazz).
Carrington, a veteran producer and composer, is joined by Esperanza Spalding, Dianne Reeves, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Nona Hendryx, Cassandra Wilson, Helen Sung, Tineke Postma, Geri Allen, Patrice Rushen, Ingrid Jensen, Sheila E. and Gretchen Parlato, with special appearances by iconic figures such as the legendary Angela Davis.
Since her debut in 1989, Carrington has established a reputation for assembling artists of varying styles into an eclectic brand of jazz that incorporates elements of bebop, soul, funk and much more. The Grammy-nominated artist creates music that adheres to the traditions of jazz yet speaks to a much broader and more diverse audience. Carrington brings this same diverse sensibility to The Mosaic Project, an album that once again gathers a myriad of voices and crystallizes them into a multi-faceted whole that far outweighs the sum of its parts.
“The Mosaic Project is a beautiful gathering of great female artists,” Carrington said. “Though it is my project, it is the personalities, the lives, and the talent of all of these women that make this project so special and indeed a group offering and unique statement we made together based on common, yet diverse, points of view.”