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Orrin Evans and the Captain Black Big Band: Walk A Mile In My Shoe
by Steve Plever
A glance through the track list--with covers of Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye and two swing-era vocal standards--could give you the wrong impression. Yes, this is a very accessible and soulful album, but it is serious and heartfelt jazz, with Orrin Evans' personal stamp making it work. Blues, soul and gospel sounds share the stage here with swing, straight-ahead and avant-garde influences--no surprise given Evans' decade of playing with the Mingus Big Band. Evans' piano sets the tone ...
Continue ReadingThe Len Pierro Jazz Orchestra: As I Was Saying
by Jack Bowers
Remember the good old days before high-tech hardware and software seized control and the country's leading big bands were recorded in a studio or in concert employing a wide dynamic range with no overdubs or splices to enhance the performance? Composer and arranger Len Pierro does, which is why he planned As I Was Saying, the second album with his Philadelphia-based Jazz Orchestra, to mirror those classic recordings by the likes of Woody Herman, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Buddy Rich ...
Continue ReadingOrrin Evans and the Captain Black Big Band: Walk A Mile In My Shoe
by Angelo Leonardi
Il nuovo disco di Orrin Evans e della sua Captain Black Big Band ci ricorda l'importanza delle radici per la comunità musicale afroamericana: il gospel, il blues, le big band, i cantanti e strumentisti storici. Una risorsa che è anche identità collettiva e forza culturale. Come ha sempre fatto in passato, il pianista e bandleader di Philadelphia s'ispira alla tradizione per rinnovarla e arricchirla, con passione e freschezza. Stavolta le orchestrazioni sono funzionali alle interpretazioni di quattro prodigiosi ...
Continue ReadingJim Levendis: The Big Band Project
by Jack Bowers
Jim Levendis knew that time was running out. In his mid-seventies, the veteran Philadelphia-area trumpeter and educator had contracted ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), the effects of which were rapidly sapping his energy and ability to function. As the disease progressed, Levendis confided in Len Pierro, a band mate in the Ward Marston band, that there was one thing he would dearly love to do while he was still able: record some of the big-band arrangements he had written over the ...
Continue ReadingOrrin Evans and the Captain Black Big Band: The Intangible Between
by Paul Rauch
Pianist Orrin Evans has a deep understanding of the unshakeable bond between fellowship, humanity and the creative process. That knowledge has guided him through creating a remarkable catalog of music as both a leader and sideman, along the way, experiencing the fellowship of a collective of musicians he often refers to as “The Village." The Village is indeed real, and most aptly expressed musically through the The Captain Black Big Band, Evans' ensemble of anywhere between nine and ...
Continue ReadingMichelle Lordi: Drive
by Victor L. Schermer
It's difficult to conceive how this wonderful album of restrained and subtly rendered ballads came to be called Drive, a term which leads the listener to expect a package of revved up swing or rock. However, you don't have to be a cryptologist to realize that it comes from the last track, “Drive," which contains the line “Who's gonna drive you home?" This sense of melancholy and hoped for love, like so much of the American Songbook, is the essence ...
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