Jazz Articles about Bill Cunliffe

About Bill Cunliffe

Album Review

Grammy-nominated pianist Bill Cunliffe loves a good melody. He's recorded a couple of sets of Reed Kotler's beautifully lyrical tunes, most recently Tomo (Torii, '05). With his latest offering, Imaginacion, the pianist/arranger wraps some melodies--his own and a few classics--in a strong Latin vibe.The expanded lineup, featuring two trombones, two trumpets, and a reed player, plus piano and bass, along with three percussionists, offers more harmonic possiblities, and Cunliffe has a genius in this arena, crafting lush washes ...

225

Album Review

Bill Cunliffe: Tomo

by Germein Linares
June 21, 2005

Tomo is the second album on Torri honoring composer Reed Kotler, following last year's release of It's About Love by pianist/arranger Bill Cunliffe. Though little known outside San Francisco, Kotler is a modern composer who seems to have struck an appreciative chord with the Los Angeles-based Cunliffe.As with It's About Love, the music on Tomo is gentle and relaxing. Offering a handsome set of twelve tunes, the group of saxophonist Bob Sheppard, guitarist Larry Koonse, pianist Bill Cunliffe, ...

226

Album Review

Bill Cunliffe: Tomo

by Dan McClenaghan
March 15, 2005

Pianist Bill Cunliffe, winner of the 1989 Thelonious Monk International Jazz Competition, seems to be making something of a career out of recording Reed Kotler tunes. He did that with Bobby Shew, Gary Foster and Friends Play the Music of Reed Kotler in 2002; Bill Cunliffe and Gary Foster: It's About Love: The Music of Reed Kotler in 2003; and now he offers up Tomo: The Music of Reed Kotler. Five musicians are named on the disc's cover, ...

219

Album Review

Bill Cunliffe: Tomo

Read "Tomo" reviewed by Michael P. Gladstone

by Michael P. Gladstone
March 10, 2005

It's always a pleasure to hear a release from the Torii catalogue. The five musicians presented here often play together in each other's company and also appear on other Torii albums, including 2002's Bobby Shew, Gary Foster and Friends Play the Music of Reed Kotler, and two albums from the next year, It's About Love: The Music of Reed Kotler and Bill Cunliffe's How My Heart Sings: The Music of Earl Zindars.“Tomo" is a Japanese word for friend ...

274

Album Review

Bill Cunliffe/Gary Foster: It's About Love

Read "It's About Love" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
March 6, 2004

The genius of this teaming of pianist Bill Cunliffe and saxophonist Gary Foster on It's About Love is their ability to play jazz that evokes images of dapper men decked out in gleaming tuxedos, elegant bejewled ladies draped in sparkling evening gowns, all sipping from long-stemmed glasses of bubbly champagne. Classy sounding stuff. And Bill Cunliffe is on a roll. Last year's How My Heart Sings (Torii Records), a sextet recording featuring the songs of the overlooked tunesmith Earl Zindars, ...

626

Interview

A Fireside Chat With Bill Cunliffe

by AAJ Staff
February 29, 2004

There is a tendency to be indifferent to the familiar -an absence of appreciation with an assumption of the routine. But there is a wisdom in nothing lasts forever. So perhaps, it would behoove us to be grateful that we have musicians locally like Bill Cunliffe (unedited and in his own words), who too yearns for a renewed sense of community. With harmonic and lyrical sensibilities rivaling certified headliners in celebrated New York, Cunliffe has certainly honored Los Angeles with ...

190

Live Review

Bill Cunliffe Latin Jazz Nonet

by Craig Jolley
February 29, 2004

Bill Cunliffe Latin Jazz Nonet Spazio Sherman Oaks, CA February 16, 2004 As with his other projects Bill Cunliffe's new band runs in an intelligent, fresh direction. An outgrowth of his straight-ahead sextet, the key to this band (besides the extra percussion) is the double trombones with the fuller, darker sound available. At times Cunliffe summons up a “Moorish" flavor ("Sketches of Spain"), but more often he gets a little big band ...