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Jazz Articles about Hafez Modirzadeh
About Hafez Modirzadeh
Instrument: Saxophone, tenor
Related Articles | Concerts | Albums | Photos | Similar ToWarriors of the Wonderful Sound: Soundpath
by Mark Corroto
If we alter President John F. Kennedy's 1962 moon spaceflight speech just a bit, it easily fits the big band adaptation of Muhal Richard Abrams' magnum opus Soundpath, “We choose to perform this composition not because it is easy, but because it is hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept." Accepting the challenge was band leader Bobby Zankel and ...
read moreHafez Modirzadeh: Facets
by Hrayr Attarian
Innovative composer and saxophonist Hafez Modirzadeh has always pushed the idiomatic envelope in his work. His eighth release as a leader, the stimulating Facets is, as hinted on the cover art, a musical kaleidoscope. Consisting of 18 short tracks the album explores various time signatures, modes and tonal colors that fuse many musical traditions. Three equally idiosyncratic artists take turns for a set of solos and duets with Modirzadeh. “Facet Sorey," for instance, is a crystalline tune with ...
read moreWarriors of the Wonderful Sound: Soundpath
by Giuseppe Segala
Nel 2011 il sassofonista di Filadelfia Bobby Zankel, leader della big band The Warriors of the Wonderful Sound e promotore di laboratori di musica contemporanea, propose a Muhal Richard Abrams un lavoro compositivo che avrebbe dovuto essere affidato alla band, con la direzione dello stesso pianista. Operazioni di questo tipo erano già state realizzate da Zankel negli anni precedenti con le musiche per big band di Julius Hemphill, dirette da Marty Ehrlich, poi con composizioni di Rudresh Mahanthappa e Steve ...
read moreHafez Modirzadeh with Kris Davis, Tyshawn Sorey and Craig Taborn: Facets
by Troy Dostert
A rigorous, sometimes imposingly cerebral innovator, tenor saxophonist Hafez Modirzadeh has dedicated himself since the 1980s to ever more ambitious ways of opening up the Western musical tradition to scrutiny. A particular obsession is the restrictive quality of conventional instrumental tunings, which, as Modirzadeh perceives them, can limit the possibilities available to improvisers and composers alike, especially when contrasted with the less confining musical traditions of the Middle East. One of his pathbreaking efforts in this regard was his Radif ...
read moreSoundpath
by Victor L. Schermer
Muhal Richard Abrams (1930-2017) was a revered pianist, composer and teacher of great capability and range who, in addition to his own achievements, inspired and influenced many jazz musicians in both the mainstream and avant-garde categories. Largely self-taught as a result of a personal decision to follow his own path, and early on pursuing church music, big band, blues, bebop and avant-garde jazz in his home city of jny: Chicago, he grasped music from its roots, and so was able ...
read moreHafez Modirzadeh: In Convergence Liberation
by Alberto Bazzurro
Inciso nel 2011 riunendo pagine tutte a firma del multistrumentista di origine iraniana (ma nato a Durham, Carolina del Nord, nel 1962) Hafez Modirzadeh, questo lavoro è per più di un verso emblematico di come si possa far felicemente convivere ambizioni compositive post-accademiche, seduzioni di memoria etnica e pruriti jazzistici di stampo contemporaneo.Vi trovano posto cinque brani singoli e tre suite ("Karna Passages," “Suite Compost" e “Sor Juana," rispettivamente in tre, quattro e sei movimenti), il tutto su ...
read moreHafez Modirzadeh: In Convergence Liberation
by Dan Bilawsky
Is music truly a universal language? That's a question that's a bit complicated to answer. While music has the potential to be a universal language, and it remains a common platform of communication for so many, it hasn't really fulfilled that potential thus far. Regional accents and dialects still abound, isolating and separating listeners and performers into different cliques and communities. Every fully functioning human ear can certainly take everything in, regardless of what tunings, scales, and rhythmic structures are ...
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