Jazz Articles about Drew Gress

About Drew Gress

Album Review

Yelena Eckemoff: Better Than Gold and Silver

Read "Better Than Gold and Silver" reviewed by Mark Sullivan

by Mark Sullivan
November 11, 2018

Russian-born pianist/composer Yelena Eckemoff began setting verses from the Bible's Book of Psalms shortly after her conversion to Christianity, even before her emigration to the United States. But she waited until she had considerable experience working with jazz musicians before attempting these jazz arrangements. The first disc in this double disc set presents settings with two vocalists, tenor Tomás Cruz and mezzo-soprano Kim Mayo, accompanied by a remarkable band: trumpeter Ralph Alessi, guitarist Ben Monder, violinist Christian Howes, bassist Drew ...

Album Review

Yelena Eckemoff: In The Shadow Of A Cloud

Read "In The Shadow Of A Cloud" reviewed by Neri Pollastri

by Neri Pollastri
October 5, 2018

Continua la ricca vena creativa della pianista e compositrice russa Yelena Eckemoff, di formazione classica ma dedita al jazz dal suo arrivo negli U.S.A., nel 1991. Questa vena si concretizza in una fitta serie di album (l'ultimo di cui ci siamo occupati è Leaving Everything Behind, del 2016) registrati con formazioni sempre diverse e ogni volta composte da musicisti di altissimo livello. Stavolta il gruppo che realizza questo doppio CD è un quintetto, con una ritmica tra le ...

Album Review

Yelena Eckemoff: Better Than Gold and Silver

Read "Better Than Gold and Silver" reviewed by Tyran Grillo

by Tyran Grillo
September 29, 2018

Some albums attempt to explain sacred text. Others adorn, elevate, or dramatize it. Better Than Gold and Silver does something rarer. It listens. It waits. It receives. Yelena Eckemoff does not set the Psalms of David to music so much as she attends to them, as though all that remains is to hear what still trembles in their wake. The result is not doctrine rendered audible, but scripture softened by silence, memory, and breath. Belief here is not asserted. It ...

Album Review

Yelena Eckemoff: In The Shadow Of A Cloud

Read "In The Shadow Of A Cloud" reviewed by Tyran Grillo

by Tyran Grillo
August 21, 2017

Following her successful quintet outing, Blooming Tall Phlox, pianist Yelena Eckemoff retains the ensemble's name while quietly reshaping its interior life, recalibrating the personnel for another generous two-disc statement. Joined this time by Chris Potter on reeds and flute, Adam Rogers on electric guitar, Drew Gress on double bass, and Gerald Cleaver on drums, Eckemoff unfurls a map of 14 new compositions that trace some of her most fluid and contemplative terrain yet. These pieces feel resolutely discovered, as though ...

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Album Review

Yelena Eckemoff: In The Shadow Of A Cloud

Read "In The Shadow Of A Cloud" reviewed by John Kelman

by John Kelman
August 14, 2017

She may rarely perform live in this context, but Yelena Eckemoff has managed to build, over just seven years and a mammoth eleven releases--including her second release of 2017, In the Shadow of a Cloud--a loyal and growing following in the jazz world. It's all the more remarkable for a multi-talented expat Russian pianist who began life in the classical world, and only entered the jazz world in 2010 with Cold Sun. But there's even more to marvel ...

Album Review

Drew Gress: The Sky Inside

Read "The Sky Inside" reviewed by Vincenzo Roggero

by Vincenzo Roggero
May 16, 2014

Formazione stellare quella che Drew Gress presenta per il suo debutto sull'etichetta tedesca Pirouet, e quintetto consolidato fin dal lontano 2005 quando impressionò con l'ottimo 7 Black Butterflies . Formazione di musicisti avventurosi, spinti da un insaziabile spirito di ricerca, seppur con prospettive e gradi differenti di intensità, che... sembra incappare, se non in un esercizio di stile, sicuramente in un compitino ben fatto, senza sbavature, dove tutto funziona a meraviglia, scorre liscio come l'olio e ogni cosa è sotto ...

Album Review

Drew Gress: The Sky Inside

Read "The Sky Inside" reviewed by AAJ Italy Staff

by AAJ Italy Staff
October 15, 2013

Formazione stellare quella che Drew Gress presenta per il suo debutto sull'etichetta tedesca Pirouet, e quintetto consolidato fin dal lontano 2005 quando debuttò con l'ottimo 7 Black Butterflies. Formazione di musicisti avventurosi, spinti da un insaziabile spirito di ricerca seppur con prospettive e gradi differenti di intensità che... sembra incappare se non in un esercizio di stile, sicuramente in un compitino ben fatto, senza sbavature, dove tutto funziona a meraviglia, scorre liscio come l'olio e ogni cosa è sotto controllo. ...