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Toby Koenigsberg
Toby Koenigsberg is a jazz pianist, composer, and educator. He leads a working trio and has released three albums as a leader: Push, a live recording featuring saxophonist Rich Perry; Sense (Origin Records), praised by Cadence, the All Music Guide, and All About Jazz – New York; and Drift (Ninjazz Records), which interprets the music of Elliott Smith. He has performed throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia, including at the Rochester International Jazz Festival, Jazz Festival Calgary, the Värinää Festivaali in Finland, and the Knitting Factory in New York City.
Koenigsberg received his Master of Music degree in Jazz and Contemporary Media from the Eastman School of Music, where he received the Schirmer Award, and pursued graduate study in classical piano at the Peabody Conservatory. He has presented at the annual conference of the International Association for Jazz Education, the Royal Academy of Music in London, the Shenyang Conservatory in China, and Shikoku University in Japan, where he held a visiting professorship for over a decade.
He is an Associate Professor of Jazz Piano at the University of Oregon, and the author of six books on piano playing, musicianship, songwriting, and music production. His Contemporary Songwriting has been adopted as a required text at colleges and universities across the United States; its third edition, Contemporary Songwriting with Ableton Live and GarageBand, publishes from Bloomsbury Academic. He is also the author of the five-volume method Toby's Piano Improvisation.
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Toby Koenigsberg Trio: Drift
by Dan McClenaghan
Pianist Toby Koenigsberg explored some of bop icon Bud Powell's tunes, the Great American Songbook gem “My Foolish Heart," and Bill Evans' “Show Type Tune" on his outstanding 2005 Origin Records release, Sense. And there was a warped (in a good sense) take on the “Stella By Starlight," also from the Great American Songbook. All of it sounded very modern. He pushes the modernity thing ahead further with his Drift, an homage to the late indy rock artist Elliot Smith. ...
Continue ReadingToby Koenigsberg Trio: Sense
by Terrell Kent Holmes
On Sense, the Toby Koenigsberg Trio approaches jazz from intriguing angles, bringing an exciting energy and edginess to both originals and standards. The group's preferred organizing principle can be described as deconstruction by addition. The pianist/leader approaches Bud Powell's “Oblivion by artfully inserting bits and pieces of the melody like someone would assemble a jigsaw puzzle: an arpeggio here, a phrase there, until the picture is clear. Another Powell tune, “So Sorry Please, initially stumbles around like a drunk on ...
Continue ReadingToby Koenigsberg Trio: Sense
by Dan McClenaghan
On Sense, pianist Toby Koenigsberg's trio offers up a wistful and straightforward take on the American Songbook classic “My Foolish Heart," including a poignant, spare reading of the familiar melody. However, everything else on the disc pushes the boundaries.The trio opens and closes the set with tunes by the New York-based trumpeter Andre Canniere: “Thirteen Species" and “Realizing." Both, like much of this material, have a mildly (and sometimes not so mildly) surreal quality--noir-ish in the case of ...
Continue ReadingPianists continue to lead Modern Jazz in a direction that explores the future without letting go of the past.... (The Toby Koenigsberg Trio) offers creative forays into Jazz’s core. Two brief interpretations of "Stella by Starlight" serve to demonstrate the unique approach that the pianist and his trio apply to their work. Nothing is straightforward. Everything comes with a deep sense of adventure.... Koenigsberg ... drives his trio with energy. He likes to drive from the keyboard with a convincing aura that says, “We are here to deliver an exotic message that you’ve never heard before”...
Music
Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson
Thirteenth Species
From: SenseBy Toby Koenigsberg
Toby Koenigsberg
Instrument: Piano
Born: September 3, 1974
