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Samo Salamon Ra Kalam Bob Moses Orchestra: Dream Suites vol. 1
by Alberto Bazzurro
Basta scorrere i nomi dei musicisti coinvolti nell'operazione per capire di quale rappresentatività per una data scena della più creativa e verace attualità jazzistica “unga" questo assolutamente notevole album cofirmato dal chitarrista sloveno Samo Salamon e dal batterista newyorchese Bob Moses. Lo compongono tre soli ampi brani (dai tredici minuti alla mezz'ora appena scarsa) incisi nel novembre 2023 e fondati sulla pratica della libera improvvisazione (non si parla neppure di conduction, in questo caso), raggiungendo una dimensione formale assolutamente invidiabile, ...
Continue ReadingMike Holober & The Gotham Jazz Orchestra: This Rock We're On: Imaginary Letters
by Jack Bowers
This Rock We're On, acclaimed composer and pianist Mike Holober's 2024 recording as leader of the Gotham Jazz Orchestra, is challenging to summarize in mere words, as it consists of a multi-part suite (on two CDs) which blends jazz, classical and art songs in a thematic environment that uses a series of “imaginary letters" from a half dozen writers, artists and activists. Holober's orchestral response to them is the premise for “a meditation on the beauty of nature and the ...
Continue ReadingMike Holober & the Gotham City Orchestra: This Rock We're On: Imaginary Letters
by Angelo Leonardi
Dopo gli ultimi superlativi album orchestrali (Balancing Act, Palmetto 2015 e Hiding Out, Zoho 2019) la nuova incisione di Mike Holober con la Gotham Jazz Orchestra non dovrebbe stupirci, eppure questo doppio album ci ha nuovamente colpito. L'aggiunta di Chris Potter, John Patitucci, Nir Felder e della cantante brasiliana Jamile Staevie Ayres all'orchestra rende infatti il progetto quanto mai esaltante. Questi nomi completano un organico già nutrito di solisti ragguardevoli come Marvin Stamm e Scott Wendholt alle trombe, ...
Continue ReadingMike Holober: This Rock We're On: Imaginary Letters
by Dan McClenaghan
We live on a rock. A few billion years of the workings of the complexities of carbon chemistry put us here. The systems and intricacies of every element that has unfolded to maintain us should be respected and preserved. Mike Holober's This Rock We're On: Imaginary Letters, featuring Holober and his Gotham Jazz Orchestra, digs into this theme in a sprawling, two-disc big band jazz outing. Like life itself, and the resulting ecosystems, this multi-movement suite--an effort that is the ...
Continue ReadingFrank Carlberg Large Ensemble: Elegy for Thelonious
by Alberto Bazzurro
Dopo aver circumnavigato la musica di Monk in diversi contesti, prevalentemente come pianista in piccoli organici, Frank Carlberg, finlandese di nascita ma newyorchese a tutti gli effetti, affronta in questo suo ultimo, ambizioso lavoro l'ineffabile Thelonious da una prospettiva diversa: dedicandogli una serie di composizioni proprie ispirate a lui e alla sua arte così fuori da ogni ovvietà (non senza scampoli tematici acchiappati al volo e titolazioni spesso molto gustose ed emblematiche, da “Scallop's Scallop" a “Wrinkle on Trinkle," in ...
Continue ReadingFrank Carlberg Large Ensemble: Elegy for Thelonious
by Jerome Wilson
Pianist Frank Carlberg has been exploring the music of Thelonious Monk for some time, most specifically on his large group album, Monk Dreams, Hallucinations, and Nightmares, (Sunnyside, 2017). This new album has Carlberg returning to the large ensemble format for more Monk investigations, but this time approaching the work in a more splintered and abstract fashion. He does not simply interpret familiar Monk tunes. He writes compositions and arrangements which stitch Monk riffs and ideas into new fabrics, ...
Continue ReadingFrank Carlberg Large Ensemble: Elegy for Thelonious
by Mark Corroto
There was a sardonic saying circulating a few years ago that observed, “It's Frank Sinatra's world, we just live in it." While that was a backhanded compliment, tailoring it to the subject of this large ensemble recording, we would call it a commendation. Pianist, composer, and conductor Frank Carlberg is telling us, “It's Thelonious Monk's world, and (thank god) we live in it." Carlberg has been a disciple of Monk for decades, recording his music in a piano trio format ...
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