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The Mark Masters Ensemble: Night Talk: The Alec Wilder Songbook
by Pierre Giroux
Alec Wilder was born in 1907 and died in 1980, and might well have been described as an eccentric renaissance man. He composed opera, musicals, film music, popular songs, and chamber music, along with publishing in 1975 one of the most read books on popular music: American Popular Song: the Great Innovators 1900-1950. The Mark Masters Ensemble is a tight knit and imaginative Octet which can stake their claim on mining the gold contained in Alec Wilder's popular ...
Continue ReadingThe Mark Masters Ensemble: Night Talk: The Alec Wilder Songbook
by Jack Bowers
Night Talk, the eighth album by celebrated arranger Mark Masters' superb West Coast-based ensemble, is subtitled “The Alec Wilder Songbook Featuring Gary Smulyan." Indeed, Smulyan's is an impressive solo voice (but hardly the only one) in an eloquent songbook that appraises eight of Wilder's tasteful compositions, including a pair of his best-known melodies, “Moon and Sand" and “I'll Be Around." As Masters arranged every number for his hand-picked octet, nothing more need be said about that save ...
Continue ReadingMark Masters: Our Metier
by Angelo Leonardi
Splendido arrangiatore di scuola mainstream, Mark Masters guida formazioni orchestrali fin dai primi anni ottanta e gran parte della sua produzione discografica l'ha incisa per l'etichetta Capri di Thomas Burns. I suoi dischi recenti--compreso l'ultimo Blue Skylight -erano concept album dedicati a grandi nomi del jazz, come Clifford Brown, Duke Ellington, Lee Konitz o Charles Mingus ma in questo disco usa solo sue composizioni, eseguite da un singolare ensemble costituito da un sestetto di prestigiosi solisti e una ...
Continue ReadingMark Masters: Our Metier
by Jerome Wilson
There are a lot of fine composers writing for large jazz ensembles today, so many that some names can get lost in the shuffle. Mark Masters is a case in point. You don'r hear about him often, possibly because many of his recordings feature his ensembles playing the music of other composers like trombonist Grachan Moncur III, baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan and tenor saxophonist Dewey Redman. However the music on Our Metier all comes from Masters' own pen and it ...
Continue ReadingMark Masters Ensemble: Our Metier
by Dan McClenaghan
Mark Masters, an extraordinarily talented and perhaps undersung arranger of large ensembles jazz, has spent a good deal of artistic energy on crafting recordings that explore other people's compositions. His Capri Records output includes The Clifford Brown Project (2003), celebrating the sounds of the too-soon-gone trumpet legend; Porgy and Bess (2005), from the George Gershwin songbook; One Day With Lee (2004), a celebration of alto saxophonist Lee Konitz; Farewell Walter Dewey Redman (2008), a nod to another great sax man; ...
Continue ReadingMark Masters: Blue Skylight
by Angelo Leonardi
Mark Masters è uno dei massimi esponenti contemporanei dell'orchestrazione mainstream. In trent'anni d'attività professionale ha inciso una decina di dischi, in formazioni comprendenti strumentisti di primo piano come Oliver Lake, Lee Konitz, Billy Harper, Peter Erskine o Steve Kuhn. Come altri suoi lavori anche questo progetto è un concept album dedicato a protagonisti della storia musicale afro- americana ma vanno evidenziate alcune novità. Il tributo è rivolto a due musicisti, Charles Mingus e Gerry Mulligan, con un medio ...
Continue ReadingThe Mark Masters Ensemble: Blue Skylight
by Jack Bowers
California-based composer / arranger Mark Masters, who has already recorded salutes to Clifford Brown, Jimmy Knepper, Dewey Redman, Steely Dan, the Gershwin brothers and even the Duke Ellington saxophone section, directs his attention and considerable talents this time around to the music of a pair of legendary jazz trend-setters who were in many respects polar opposites: bassist Charles Mingus and saxophonist Gerry Mulligan. To amplify his purpose, Masters made two pivotal decisions, each of which serves to ...
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