Jazz Articles about Danilo Pérez

Danilo Perez: Across the Crystal Sea

by Joel Roberts
September 12, 2008

Pianist Danilo Perez' Across the Crystal Sea, his ninth album as a leader, succeeds better than most jazz with strings efforts because the orchestral arrangements, by legendary composer and producer Claus Ogerman, work with, not against the improvisations of Perez and his top-notch trio. This is no repeat of the hackneyed formula of jazz players soloing on top of a lush string section; it's a truly integrated meeting of jazz and classical music, each tune a self-contained jazz concerto.

Danilo Perez: Across the Crystal Sea

by Mark F. Turner
August 20, 2008

The cover art is descriptive of the recording's music--gentle brushstrokes of pastel colors portraying a picturesque vista of tranquility. This visual is indicative of what's in store from pianist Danilo Pérez's most challenging release to date, Across the Crystal Sea.A pianist whose tenure with the Wayne Shorter Quartet (e.g., Beyond the Sound Barrier (2005, Verve Music)) is etched in modern jazz. Born in Panama and living in Boston, Pérez is also a leader/composer whose recordings have earned him ...

Danilo Perez Big Band: Panama Suite

by George Kanzler
April 10, 2008

Recorded in Boston with students and faculty of both the Berklee College of Music and the New England Conservatory in the band, this suite by Danilo Perez commemorates five years of the Panama Jazz Festival, where it was also first sold this January. The CD is short, presenting only the quarter-hour suite, described as “a three-movement composition that combines urban sounds with Panamanian folkloric elements in a big band setting." Most impressive is the third and final movement, ...

Danilo P: Live at the Jazz Showcase

by Javier AQ Ortiz
September 27, 2005

The Danilo Pérez Trio recorded Live at the Jazz Showcase in December 2003, ensconcing the trio in the longstanding history of this Chicago club.Pérez leads drummer Adam Cruz and bassist Ben Street from the piano as they interpret a repertoire covering mostly original material, although there are hard bop renditions of material by Rubén Blades, Monk, Silvio Rodriguez, and Stevie Wonder. The latter, however, are transmogrified as well as vested with the greatest amount of interpretative time. “Paula ...

Danilo Perez Trio: Live at the Jazz Showcase

by Robert R. Calder
July 9, 2005

Danilo Perez Live! is the intended message of this set. Somebody must have decided that the pianist sounds better (livelier, more spontaneous) on gigs than in the studio. Startlingly young in Dizzy Gillespie's United Nation (not Nations) Orchestra, Perez (born in 1978) is currently the pianist in Wayne Shorter's quartet. While this live trio set goes to some very various places, variety is delimited by the pianist's strong compositional identity.It hardly matters that the opener might have been ...

Danilo Perez Trio: Live at the Jazz Showcase

by Jerry D'Souza
May 14, 2005

Danilo Perez's first live recording at the Jazz Showcase in Chicago with bassist Ben Street and drummer Adam Cruz finds the trio building an empathic level of communication; having played together for two and a half years has its advantages. Perez is still a hard-hitting pianist, but he balances this penchant with softer tunes that profile a circumspect side and bring a glow to his explorations.

The trio opens with one of the tunes Perez calls “spontaneous compositions," ...

Danilo Perez Trio: Live at the Jazz Showcase

by John Kelman
May 4, 2005

Watching pianist Danilo Perez's career unfold has been an experience in shared exploration. He's never forgetten his Panamanian heritage, but along with pianists Edward Simon and Luis Perdomo, Perez has reflected a new dimension--a new wave of artists from Latin cultures who incorporate traditional rhythms and melodic ideas into more modern contexts that include complicated meters, abstract harmonies, and an altogether more experimental approach.

As a member of Wayne Shorter's current quartet, Perez has had the greatest exposure to date. ...