Home » Jazz Articles » Chris Colangelo
Jazz Articles about Chris Colangelo
Mark Masters Ensemble: Sam Rivers 100
by Dan McClenaghan
The Mark Masters Ensemble released Porgy and Bess Redefined! (Capri Records) in 2005. The music was taken from the George Gershwin/DuBose Heyward English-language opera, which was first performed in 1935. Masters' take on the classic was brilliantly expressed by the ensemble, who dug into his adventurous charts with freedom mixed with respect for the familiar and often-covered (most notably by the Miles Davis/Gil Evans teaming) original. It was a breakout effort for Masters. Billy Harper was there on tenor sax, ...
Continue ReadingMark Masters Ensemble: Dance, Eternal Spirits, Dance!
by Jack Bowers
In 2023-24, the celebrated arranger Mark Masters led his superb southern California-based ensemble into studios to record a pair of tribute albums. The first, Sam Rivers 100, was dedicated to the music of the late saxophonist on the one hundredth anniversary of his birth; the second, Dance, Eternal Spirits, Dance!, to that of another renowned saxophonist, Billy Harper, who is not only very much alive at age eighty-two but serves as guest soloist on both recordings. Unlike ...
Continue ReadingMark Masters: Sam Rivers 100
by Jack Bowers
Sam Rivers 100 is the first of two homages recorded in 2023-24 by arranger Mark Masters and his blue chip southern California-based ensemble. This one pays tribute to the music of the late saxophonist Sam Rivers on the hundredth anniversary of his birth; the second, Dance, Eternal Spirits, Dance! salutes the music of tenor saxophonist Billy Harper who is the ensemble's guest soloist on both albums. Rivers, who died in December 2011, was an early bebopper who ...
Continue ReadingMatt Gordy: Be With Me
by Richard J Salvucci
There is an expression of high regard for playing, “in the tradition," which basically means, yeah, that is jazz, music of the highest order. Matt Gordy's “Be With Me" is particularly arresting because it is in the tradition, but neither a recreation nor an exercise in nostalgia. Everyone from Charlie Christian to Modern Jazz Quartet has played “Topsy" (1937) in one form or another. It lends itself to multiple blues changes and swing to boppish solos, all of ...
Continue ReadingThe Matt Gordy Jazz Tonite Sextet: Be With Me
by Jack Bowers
In 2006, drummer Matt Gordy heeded the mandate to “go west, young man," moving from Boston to Los Angeles, while he was still “young at heart," and quickly becoming a mainstay of the local scene, after years of success as a jazz and classical drummer in New England, and even with the Maracaibo, Venezuela, Symphony Orchestra, where he spent nine years as chief percussionist. After fifteen years gigging in Los Angeles, Gordy decided it was time to record his first ...
Continue ReadingThe Jazz All Stars: The Jazz All Stars Volume 1
by Jim Worsley
The gigless times of 2020--the year of the Covid-19 pandemic--could have brought musicians and the industry to their collective knees, gasping for air. Instead, it resulted in more new music than ever before. It filled our lungs with fresh air. It filled our hearts and souls, not to mention our ears. New businesses opening, defying the odds and pursuing their dreams, is a relevant factor. Le Coq Records, emerging in 2020, boldly presents an all-star ensemble—featuring many of ...
Continue ReadingChris Colangelo: Elaine's Song
by AAJ Italy Staff
C'è un grandissimo senso dello swing, un unione d'intenti rara e un'intensità espressiva di sicuro spessore in Elaine's Song, il nuovo lavoro di Chris Colangelo, contrabbassita e compositore di base a Los Angeles. Per dar vita a una scaletta perlopiù strutturata attorno a degli originali, il leader si contorna di musicisti in grado di garantire un'ampia aperura di compasso timbrico - sono tre i fiatisti in squadra (Bob Sheppard, Benn Clatworthy e Zane Musa) pronti ad alternarsi o ad esprimersi ...
Continue Reading
