Jazz Articles about Ted Sirota

The Scientist Meets Ted Sirota: Heavyweight Dub

by Mark Corroto
November 16, 2013

Like fellow Chicagoan Mars Williams, Ted Sirota does not limit himself solely to jazz. The saxophonist Williams fronts the hip-hop funk freestyle band Liquid Soul and Sirota has assembled this Jamaican music band. Reggae music, the drummer's first love, has been incorporated into his longstanding jazz outfit Ted Sirota's Rebel Souls. With Heavyweight Dub he dives headlong into unexpurgated Jamaican music. Those familiar with Sirota's work in Sabertooth, who released Dr. Midnight (Delmark, 2007) and their longstanding gig ...

Take Five with Ted Sirota

by Ted Sirota
April 17, 2013

Meet Ted Sirota: Veteran Chicago drummer, Ted Sirota, has been playing the drums since 1980. Ted has lead his own band, Ted Sirota's Rebel Souls, since 1996. Rebel Souls have recorded five CD's for the Naim & Delmark labels. Ted has also played every Saturday night from 12:30-5:00am at Chicago's top jazz club, The Green Mill, for the past 18 years with Sabertooth. In January 2013, Ted embarked on his latest project--Ted Sirota's Heavyweight Dub. With his new band Ted ...

Ted Sirota's Rebel Souls: Seize the Time

by AAJ Italy Staff
January 4, 2010

Possiamo pensare a Ted Sirota come se fosse un nipotino bianco di Max Roach: come l'illustre collega Sirota si muove in fase compositiva ed esecutiva con la massima attenzione per i dettagli, lasciando intravvedere sin dai titoli un forte impegno civile. Fortunatamente, anche le doti tecniche del batterista di Chicago sono all'altezza della situazione e i suoi dischi si distinguono per la fierezza tipica dei veri leader e per la compostezza strumentale di chi la sa lunga. Questo Seize the ...

Ted Sirota's Rebel Souls: Seize The Time

by Troy Collins
September 28, 2009

In the grand tradition of such revolutionary bandleaders as Charles Mingus and Max Roach, Chicago-based drummer Ted Sirota leads his flagship band, The Rebel Souls, through their fifth long player, Seize The Time, with the same vivacious energy he fostered over their four previous releases, hearkening back to Rebel Roots (NAIM, 1996).

Despite a rotating roster of sidemen (former members include Jeb Bishop, Rob Mazurek, and Jeff Parker), Sirota has maintained the Rebel Souls for well over a ...

Ted Sirota's Rebel Souls: Seize The Time

by Glenn Astarita
September 19, 2009

U.K.-based Naim label has been a cornerstone of high-end audio quality, and that tradition continues on Seize The Time, a studio date featuring Chicago drummer Ted Sirota and his diverse perspective on the jazz idiom. The mindset, or perhaps underlying force, behind this session is encapsulated by the drummer who suggests that the world is in a state of flux, marked by compounding crises. But as the album title states, it is necessary to seize the opportunity, as crisis often ...

Ted Sirota's Rebel Souls: Seize The Time

by Mark Corroto
September 15, 2009

To call this Rebel Souls disc ambitious is not an overstatement, and to label drummer Ted Sirota and company bold, does not unnecessarily over-dramatize their mission. Seize The Time is the band's fifth disc, of which three prior releases were also on UK's NAIM--Rebel Roots (1996), Propaganda (1999) and Vs. The Forces Of Evil (2000)--preceding the US-released Breeding Resistance (Delmark, 2004).

Not one to hold his tongue, Sirota, like all great agitators, lets his voice be heard through his art. ...

Ted Sirota: Breeding Resistance

by Terrell Kent Holmes
October 25, 2004

From Billie Holiday's “Strange Fruit" to Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite, jazz has played its part in the all too frequent struggles against oppression and despotism. Drummer Ted Sirota, with his band Rebel Souls, has written another page in this long and rich tradition of protest music with Breeding Resistance , designed to raise awareness of our global situation. “Saro-Wiwa" (an elegy to a Nigerian civil rights activist), is a brass-driven tune with a lilting African rhythm that ...