Jason Rigby

Jason Rigby is an assured New York-based musician whose jazz mixes conventional and “outside” improvisation in stirring fashion. His recent release “Translucent Space” (Fresh Sound Records), is garnering rave reviews and applause, putting Rigby’s name firmly on the map of New York’s creative music scene.

Rigby’s individuated saxophone tone and improvisational approach draw inspiration from such jazz pantheon figures as John Coltrane, Joe Henderson and Dewey Redman, and he has been described as displaying “a brilliant virtuosity & flexibility while handling some very complex harmonic lines & intervals.” (George W. Carroll, The Musician’s Ombudsman, May 06)

As an impressive composer meriting wider recognition, Rigby has developed his compositional style after having listened long and hard to primary compositional influences Wayne Shorter, Philip Glass, Ornette Coleman, and classical greats Mahler, Bartok and Shostakovich.

Originally from Cleveland, OH, his formal music studies were done at Youngstown State University in Ohio, DePaul University in Chicago and the Manhattan School of Music. Rigby has studied saxophone and composition privately with Dick Oatts, Mike Abene and Rich Perry and was voted “Best College Jazz Instrumentalist” by DownBeat magazine in 1999.

Just 32-years-old, Rigby is active on the New York jazz scene. Career highlights so far include working with the Village Vanguard Jazz Orchestra; playing in Aretha Franklin’s band at Radio City Music Hall; and participating in a Cameron Brown-helmed project concerning Don Cherry jazz from the mid-‘60s. Rigby’s also a regular sideman with the Scott Dubois Quintet and at times with Mike Holober’s Gotham Jazz Orchestra, the Kris Davis Group and Eivind Opsvik’s Overseas, and the list of colleagues with whom he has performed only starts with notables David Leibman and Tony Malaby. He has taught at the New School (NYC), City College of NY and Stony Brook University and maintains a private jazz saxophone studio in NYC.

Tags

Jason Rigby saxophone, tenor

Album Review

Translucent Space by Michael P. Gladstone
Translucent Space by Jerry D'Souza
The Sage by Terrell Kent Holmes
The Sage by Troy Collins
The Sage by J Hunter
The Sage by Jerry D'Souza
The Sage by Eyal Hareuveni
One: Detroit-Cleveland Trio by Troy Dostert
One by Dan McClenaghan
One by Hrayr Attarian

May 31, 2022

In-Demand Bassist Matt Aronoff Celebrates His Debut Album Featuring...

"Rigby is strong and confident, but he also allows risk-taking, moving comfortably out of the mainstream into freer territories. Given this stellar debut, it will be quite interesting to see where Rigby's musical ventures will lead next." - Mark F. Turner, AllAboutJazz

"...the strength of Translucent Space lies in its coherence, intellect and accessibility—making it one of the year’s most remarkable debuts." - John Kelman, AllAboutJazz

"Rigby's burly tenor tone and searching improvisations recall the expressionistic flights of Ornette Coleman and Joe Henderson." - John Murph, DownBeat

"...the strength of Translucent Space lies in its coherence, intellect and accessibility—making it one of the year’s most remarkable debuts." - John Kelman, AllAboutJazz

"Rigby's burly tenor tone and searching improvisations recall the expressionistic flights of Ornette Coleman and Joe Henderson." - John Murph, DownBeat

"Rigby flirts with the same stratospheric heights Wayne Shorter explored with Miles." - J Hunter, AllAboutJazz

"...the saxophonist's quintet sustains a daunting finesse while swinging full tilt on the new The Sage." - Jim Macnie, The Village Voice

"Jason Rigby is a bold adventurous composer and saxophonist." - Jerry D'Souza, AllAboutJazz

"He blends styles artfully and gives them a tangent and direction that are out of the ordinary and, in doing so, he brings in a perspective that is as exciting as it is satisfying." - Jerry D'Souza, AllAboutJazz

"Translucent Space (Fresh Sound-New Talent), the new album by the saxophonist and bass clarinetist Jason Rigby, doesn't come by its name casually; it's an album of airy, often diaphanous music, with faint echoes of early fusion and Third Stream." - Nate Chinen, NY Times

"A robust tenor/soprano stylist in the classic Post-War mold of John Coltrane and Wayne Shorter, Rigby also embraces the harmonically unfettered lyricism of Ornette Coleman. An improviser with a composer's mindset, his concise, linear statements extrapolate the formal constraints of a tune rather than just running the changes." - Troy Collins, AllAboutJazz

"The young saxophonist's Translucent Space gave jitters a good name. The antsy music had enough grace to assuage its attack. That's a best of both worlds deal." - Jim Macnie, The Village Voice

"An arresting debut from multi-reedman Rigby...as a composer and arranger his originality is even more striking...he's created a distinctive, if eclectic, synthesis of Wayne Shorter and Ornette Coleman, with echoes of Paul Motian's trio...One to watch." - Ray Comiskey, The Irish Times (Dublin, IR)

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