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Jihye Lee: Daring Mind
by Jack Bowers
Korean-born composer Jihye Lee is a musician who knows her own mind, whether it be relentless, unshakable, revived, dissatisfied or Daring, as on her second recording for Motema Records. In 2018, Lee earned the prestigious BMI Charlie Parker Composition Prize for “Unshakable Mind," one of nine diverse themes presented here. Another, “I Dare You," is loosely based on Wayne Shorter's response when asked, “What is jazz?" It is a question Lee must also address, as her music is not only ...
Continue ReadingJihye Lee: Daring Mind
by Angelo Leonardi
Solo un talento eccezionale come Jihye Lee poteva ottenere risultati così brillanti e personali nel campo dell'orchestrazione jazz partendo quasi da zero. Nata a Seoul ed emigrata negli Stati Uniti da adolescente, quando s'iscrisse al Berklee College conosceva pochissimo il linguaggio musicale afro-americano e per niente la sua dimensione orchestrale. Dopo un decennio, studi di perfezionamento alla Manhattan School of Music col grande Jim McNeely (a cui va riconosciuto parte del merito) e un primo eccellente debutto (April, 2017), la ...
Continue ReadingJihye Lee Orchestra: Daring Mind
by Mike Jurkovic
Listening to bandleader/composer Jihye Lee and her mic-drop orchestra is like watching your life flash before your eyes. You see it all: All the richness of spirit one can attain. All the sadness one can espouse. All the waltzing mischief to which one can aspire. Testing malleability at every turn, Lee's on to an eclectic something that doesn't pass through the torpor too often: A lucid, active imagination. Thus Daring Mind, Lee's Motema Music debut, co-produced by Darcy ...
Continue ReadingDafnis Prieto Sextet: Transparency
by John Chacona
In Cuban music, emotional grandeur and extravagant virtuosity is built on a foundation of inexhaustible rhythm. So, it's no surprise to find an abundance of juicy melodies and breathtaking drumming on Transparency from drummer and MacArthur “Genius" Fellow Dafnis Prieto. Yet for all the astonishing things he does behind the kit, what stands out on Transparency is the dazzling formal sophistication of Prieto's compositions. Eight of the nine composer credits are his and the outlier, an arrangement of ...
Continue ReadingSouth Florida Jazz Orchestra: Cheap Thrills: The Music Of Rick Margitza
by Jack Bowers
In 2019, the acclaimed Michigan-bred, Paris-based tenor saxophonist Rick Margitza thought he was being asked to contribute a couple of charts to the University of South Florida Jazz Orchestra's fifth recording in its fifteen-year history as a working ensemble. But when SFJO founder and leader Chuck Bergeron looked at the charts he had an even better idea, and asked Margitza to write and / or arrange everything on the album, which thus became Cheap Thrills: The Music of Rick Margitza. ...
Continue ReadingSouth Florida Jazz Orchestra: Cheap Thrills: The Music Of Rick Margitza
by Pierre Giroux
The concept of a large, tightly-knit big band in a recording studio, on a concert or jazz club stage may just be a plug-in memory in today's environment. Fortunately there is the fifteenth anniversary recording of The South Florida Jazz Orchestra directed by bassist/bandleader Chuck Bergeron, entitled Cheap Thrills: The Music Of Rick Margitza, to remind us what a disciplined inventive big band sounds like. With the exception of George and Ira Gershwin's “Embraceable You," all the other ...
Continue ReadingAlex Norris Organ Quartet: Extension Deadline
by Dan Bilawsky
Extension Deadline isn't the first organ-based date that trumpeter Alex Norris put together. It is, however, the first one to see the light of day. In the liner notes for this satisfying quartet outing, Norris notes that he recorded an organ-centric record in the '90s, but that record was shelved. So it is with great satisfaction that he sees this record to its release on the BJU Records imprint. While Norris has been a fixture on the ...
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