Jazz Articles about Adrean Farrugia

About Adrean Farrugia

Album Review

Live Your Dream is the second album on which trumpet master Brad Goode and acclaimed tenor saxophonist Ernie Watts have shared the front line. The first, That's Right!, was recorded eight years earlier, in 2018. The sophomore enterprise was taped live at the North Street Cabaret in Madison, Wisconsin, something the musicians were unaware of until after the concert was over. Make no mistake, these are accomplished artists who have circled the track many times in a wide ...

Album Review

Ernesto Cervini: A Canadian Songbook

Read "A Canadian Songbook" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
April 21, 2024

Composer and drummer Ernesto Cervini is a stalwart of the Canadian creative music scene both as an artist and promoter. His ninth release as a leader, the captivating A Canadian Songbook, is a collection of seven intricate pieces, composed by him and other compatriots. Cervini, at the head of his sextet Turboprop, deftly balances collective harmony and individual expressions and delivers all with refreshing spontaneity. The leader starts off his arrangement of pianist James Hill's “Skeletons" with sparse ...

Album Review

Ernesto Cervini's Turboprop: A Canadian Songbook

Read "A Canadian Songbook" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
March 23, 2024

Toronto-based drummer, Ernesto Cervini has a “T" theme going with the groups he leads. There is the funky, forward-thinking Tetrahedron. Then we have the terrific trio (bass, drums and saxophone) TuneTown. And the third: Turboprop, presenting their fourth album, A Canadian Songbook, which digs into the musical soul of their home turf. Turboprop is a sextet with a powerhouse three-horn front line, featuring three of Canada's finest, Tara Davidson on alto saxophone, Joel Frahm on tenor saxophone, and ...

Album Review

Peter Campbell: Old Flames Never Die

Read "Old Flames Never Die" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky

by Dan Bilawsky
June 11, 2020

There's a “square peg, round hole" problem holding vocalist Peter Campbell back in the renown department. He doesn't fall into the resounding soul-stirrer category, à la Gregory Porter, the bop poet-philosopher niche, ruled by Kurt Elling, the pure experimentalist's camp, typified by Theo Bleckmann, the neo-soul realm, occupied by José James, the group-minded singer-songwriter space(s), elevated by artists like New York Voices' Peter Eldridge, or any number of other fairly clear-cut categories. The world of male vocalists is, perhaps, the ...

Album Review

Ernesto Cervini's Turboprop: Abundance

Read "Abundance" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
October 3, 2018

Delve into Toronto-based drummer Ernesto Cervini's discography and you find an artist who seems to be trying to be a force for good in the world. His CD releases feature his Ernesto Cervini Quartet, MEM3, Myraid3, and Turboprop (and others, for he is prolific). His is a sound that brims with buoyancy, whether it's a trio outing or a sextet. Abundance is the Turboprop sextet's third outing. The group could be considered Cervini's nod to the Art Blakey ...

Album Review

Adrean Farrugia: Blued Dharma

Read "Blued Dharma" reviewed by Franz A. Matzner

by Franz A. Matzner
June 14, 2018

The duet outing Blued Dharma by pianist Adrean Farrugia and tenor saxophonist Joel Frahm is a nuanced affair suitable as background to a quiet evening but also worthy of closer reading. The title track epitomizes the whole. Contemplative, balanced, subtly blended, tonally stolid, inviting, consequential. Throughout the following seven pieces, the pattern of ruminative exchange continues. Farrugia and Frahm exhibit patient thematic development and fluid, comfortable interaction. Far from a cutting contest, the music reverberates with a common ...

Album Review

Adrean Farrugia / Joel Frahm: Blued Dharma

Read "Blued Dharma" reviewed by Anya Wassenberg

by Anya Wassenberg
June 5, 2018

Long time collaborators and bandmates Adrean Farrugia and Joel Frahm explore the musical possibilities of jazz piano and saxophone on Blued Dharma with a playful and melodic take. The release offers an intriguing variety of expression and approaches. In “Blued Dharma," the title track, the two instruments wind in and around each other in melodic abandon. Frahm is a gifted player who can wring an endless melodic variety out of any chord progression. The songs, all written by ...