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John Yao and His 17 Piece Instrument: Points In Time
by Jack Bowers
The insuperable spirit of swinging big-band jazz is everywhere apparent on Points in Time, the seventh recording by New York-based composer, arranger and trombonist John Yao, and the second with his marvelous 17-Piece Instrument, a decade after its well-received debut, Flip-Flop. (See Tao, 2015). As on that earlier album, the playlist consists of seven of Yao's original compositions (and one outlier) written with the band in mind to exemplify in musical terms experiences and emotions Yao has ...
Continue ReadingJohn Yao and his 17 Piece Instrument: Points In Time
by Pierre Giroux
Trombonist and composer John Yao presents a heartfelt and personal retrospective with Points In Time. This ambitious album delves deeply into the emotional and professional journey he has undertaken over the past twenty years in New York City. Leading his precisely coordinated ensemble, aptly called His 17-Piece Instrument, comprised of talented musicians from various points along Yao's timeline. The eight original compositions in this session stem from key moments in Yao's life and artistic development. This work is not just ...
Continue ReadingMike Holober & The Gotham Jazz Orchestra: This Rock We're On: Imaginary Letters
by Jack Bowers
This Rock We're On, acclaimed composer and pianist Mike Holober's 2024 recording as leader of the Gotham Jazz Orchestra, is challenging to summarize in mere words, as it consists of a multi-part suite (on two CDs) which blends jazz, classical and art songs in a thematic environment that uses a series of “imaginary letters" from a half dozen writers, artists and activists. Holober's orchestral response to them is the premise for “a meditation on the beauty of nature and the ...
Continue ReadingChristopher Zuar Orchestra: Exuberance
by Angelo Leonardi
È decisamente un periodo d'oro per l'orchestrazione jazz. Ai molti bandleader e arrangiatori emersi nel nuovo millennio, si aggiunge decisamente Christopher Zuar, che firma il secondo album confermando le doti espresse in Musings (Sunnyside), il debutto di otto anni fa. Con un diploma al New England Conservatory e un master alla Manhattan School of Music, Zuar aggiunge una spiccata fantasia nell'arricchire il modern mainstream orchestrale di nuove suggestioni. Questo progetto è stato concepito tra il 2017 e ...
Continue ReadingChristopher Zuar Orchestra: Exuberance
by Jack Bowers
Composer/arranger Christopher Zuar's second album, Exuberance, recounts in musical terms a twisting yet picturesque journey that began seven years earlier, in 2017, when Zuar first met his now-wife, the animator Anne Beal, at MacDowell, the famed artists' residency in New Hampshire. While the relationship “blooms" in winter, there are “moments between" and other inescapable detours until “certainty" erases any lingering doubts, “exuberance" carries the day and Zuar and Beal are united as one. Yes, the music is ...
Continue ReadingMike Holober & the Gotham City Orchestra: This Rock We're On: Imaginary Letters
by Angelo Leonardi
Dopo gli ultimi superlativi album orchestrali (Balancing Act, Palmetto 2015 e Hiding Out, Zoho 2019) la nuova incisione di Mike Holober con la Gotham Jazz Orchestra non dovrebbe stupirci, eppure questo doppio album ci ha nuovamente colpito. L'aggiunta di Chris Potter, John Patitucci, Nir Felder e della cantante brasiliana Jamile Staevie Ayres all'orchestra rende infatti il progetto quanto mai esaltante. Questi nomi completano un organico già nutrito di solisti ragguardevoli come Marvin Stamm e Scott Wendholt alle trombe, ...
Continue ReadingMike Holober: This Rock We're On: Imaginary Letters
by Dan McClenaghan
We live on a rock. A few billion years of the workings of the complexities of carbon chemistry put us here. The systems and intricacies of every element that has unfolded to maintain us should be respected and preserved. Mike Holober's This Rock We're On: Imaginary Letters, featuring Holober and his Gotham Jazz Orchestra, digs into this theme in a sprawling, two-disc big band jazz outing. Like life itself, and the resulting ecosystems, this multi-movement suite--an effort that is the ...
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