Jazz Articles about Arturo O'Farrill

Arturo O'Farrill & Claudia Acuna: In These Shoes

by Woodrow Wilkins
November 20, 2008

Friends sometimes make the best partners. It's a good formula for Arturo O'Farrill and Claudia Acuna, who collaborated for In These Shoes.O'Farrill, a 2006 Grammy nominee as a pianist, composer and arranger, has put his mark on Latin and jazz styles, often mixing both. Acuna, a singer from Chile, also fuses Latin and jazz and counts among her influences, Sarah Vaughan and Celia Cruz. Together, O'Farrill and Acuna combine the best of their respective worlds.The sassy ...

Arturo O'Farrill & Claudia Acuna: In These Shoes

by Jerry D'Souza
September 27, 2008

Singer Claudia Acuna's style has been shaped by a wide range of influences. She started out singing Chilean pop and rock along with folk and opera. It seemed nothing was off limits. Jazz came calling when she came under the spell of Frank Sinatra and Sarah Vaughan, leading her to sit in with Wynton Marsalis, Danilo Perez and Michel Petrucciani when they visited Santiago. Acuna moved to New York City in 1995 and soon settled into a more permanent jazz ...

Arturo O'Farrill & the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra: Song for Chico

by Tom Greenland
June 13, 2008

Like the great Thad Jones-Mel Lewis band, pianist Arturo O'Farrill's Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra combines the best aspects of a big horn sound with small-group finesse and flexibility. Song for Chico, O'Farrill's tribute to his legendary father, evinces the influences of South American rhythms, hard bop and what might be termed “post-Latin," representing the latest branchings of a hybrid tree. Well recorded, with clean separation between the parts, the ALJO sounds off with mucho cajones, negotiating radical dynamic ...

Arturo O'Farrill and the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra: Song for Chico

by Woodrow Wilkins
June 12, 2008

There's a man doesn't care about labels or genres. He's mainly interested in two things: horns and percussion. It follows that one type of music pleases him more than any other: Latin jazz. Song for Chico, by Arturo O'Farrill and The Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra, is right up this man's alley. Pianist and music director O'Farrill, son of the late Chico O'Farrill, is a student of the Dizzy Gillespie School of Jazz Philosophy, a mind-set that says jazz is ...

Arturo O'Farrill and the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra: Song For Chico

by Dan McClenaghan
April 2, 2008

Arturo O'Farrill's Song for Chico is a disc that would have done the old man proud. The “Chico" of the title is Cuban-born Arturo “Chico" O'Farrill, the senior (b.1921; d.2001), the visionary Latin jazz composer who wrote, most famously, the “Afro-Cuban Jazz Suite," recorded in 1950 by Machito and his Afro-Cuban Orchestra, with none other than Charlie Parker sitting in the alto saxophone chair. The original recording of the suite can be heard on Charlie Parker South of the Border ...

Arturo O'Farrill: Wonderful Discovery

by Michael P. Gladstone
December 26, 2007

Pianist Arturo O'Farrill acknowledges the compositions of Dr. Eugene Marlow on Wonderful Discovery, where one of the composer's longtime wishes is fulfilled with an all Latin jazz album of his tunes. All but three of the dozen tunes are from Marlow's pen, along with one O'Farrill composition ("Arturo's Reverie"), an improvisation by percussionist Bobby Sanabria ("Raices"), and George Gershwin's “Summertime."

Marlow has composed more than 180 compositions for jazz and classical ensembles, with his songs performed by such ...

Arturo O'Farrill and Friends: Wonderful Discovery

by Ken Dryden
October 11, 2007

Even though Dr. Eugene Marlow has an impressive résumé as a composer/arranger and educator, many jazz fans are likely to have never heard of him at all though he has written numerous jazz and classical pieces for solo instruments, chamber ensembles and big bands, while also participating in the BMI Jazz Composers Workshop since 1998. Wonderful Discovery provides an excellent introduction to his compositions. This session features a large Latin jazz ensemble, well-led by pianist Arturo O'Farrill, with a strong ...