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Brandon Lopez

New York-based composer and bassist working at the fringes of jazz, free improvisation, noise and new music. His music has been praised as “brutal” (Chicago Reader) and “relentless” (The New York Times).

From the New York Philharmonic's David Geffen Hall to the DIY basements of Brooklyn, Lopez has worked beside many luminaries of jazz, classical, poetry, and experimental music, including Fred Moten, John Zorn, Okkyung Lee, Ingrid Laubrock, Tony Malaby, Tyshawn Sorey, Bill Nace, Chris Potter, Edwin Torres, Tom Rainey, Cecilia Lopez, Sun Ra Arkestra, Susan Alcorn, Mette Rasmussen, and many others.

As a 2019–2020 Artist in Residence at Roulette, Lopez will play with his trio consisting of Gerald Cleaver, & Steve Baczkowski, a 4tet adding Cecilia Lopez, as well as a solo performance and duet with Greg Kelley. This continues Lopez's work as 2018 Artist-in-Residence at Issue Project Room and 2018 Van Lier Fellow at Roulette Intermedium, Recent highlight performances include opening the 2018–2019 season of the New York Philharmonic as a featured soloist in Ashley Fure’s “Filament” and a number of works with John Zorn, including the Zorn’s 35th anniversary of “Cobra”.

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Album Review

Satoko Fujii: Hyaku: One Hundred Dreams

Read "Hyaku: One Hundred Dreams" reviewed by Alberto Bazzurro


Inciso al DiMenna Center di New York nel settembre 2022, questo album è forse il migliore, il più importante e ambizioso, realizzato dalla pianista giapponese in tempi recenti (e sappiamo quanto corposa sia la sua produzione da un po' di anni in qua). Basta, da subito, scorrere i nomi coinvolti nel progetto (in special modo il “grande vecchio" Wadada Leo Smith) per rendersene conto. La musica, poi, ci toglie da ogni dubbio o imbarazzo: siamo di fronte a un lavoro ...

Album Review

Whit Dickey Quartet: Astral Long Form: Staircase In Space

Read "Astral Long Form: Staircase In Space" reviewed by Alberto Bazzurro


Al suo secondo album in veste di leader per i tipi della Tao Forms dopo l'eccellente Village Mothership, in trio con Matthew Shipp e William Parker (estensore delle note di copertina di questo nuovo capitolo, inciso nel febbraio 2021), Whit Dickey coglie altrettanto felicemente (e, diremmo, naturalmente) nel segno alla testa di questo quartetto (tutti suoi i brani in scaletta), estremamente agguerrito e forte di individualità (a cominciare da Mat Maneri, uno che caratterizza sempre massicciamente ogni lavoro a cui ...

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Album Review

Satoko Fujii: Hyaku: One Hundred Dreams

Read "Hyaku: One Hundred Dreams" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan


Country music artist Merle Haggard (1937 -2016) released 66 studio albums in his day, along with five instrumental recordings and several live and compilation discs. When asked in a late-career interview if his upcoming album was a good one, he answered (paraphrasing). “I don't know. I've made so many I don't know if the next one's any good or not." He was probably pulling the interviewer's leg. It is hard to imagine an artist presenting a new work ...

4
Album Review

Fred Moten, Brandon López, Gerald Cleaver: Moten/López/Cleaver

Read "Moten/López/Cleaver" reviewed by Mark Corroto


Chuck D of Public Enemy fame once said, “rap music is the CNN of the ghetto." His words, coupled with samples and the scratching of turntables, were revelatory in their day, very much like a five-minute news update. Poet and cultural critic Fred Moten's words are more like a deep dive graduate colloquy. He presents his poetry together with the accomplished improvising musicians, bassist Brandon López and drummer Gerald Cleaver. At a first pass, listeners will certainly be ...

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Album Review

Whit Dickey Quartet: Root Perspectives

Read "Root Perspectives" reviewed by Mark Corroto


If it were possible to inhale an entire recording, Root Perspectives by drummer Whit Dickey's quartet might be the perfect delivery system. The music Dickey has put together comes as currents of wind, both a breeze and a gale. It is a drummer-led recording, but with any session this drummer leads (or plays in as sideman) his playing always complements without dominating the music. His new quartet includes pianist Matthew Shipp. Together, the pair have recorded dozens of ...

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Album Review

Whit Dickey Quartet: Astral Long Form: Staircase In Space

Read "Astral Long Form: Staircase In Space" reviewed by Mark Corroto


As leader of the Whit Dickey Quartet, the drummer placed total faith in his bandmates for this studio session. The accompanying materials quote Dickey, “I asked them all to not think of time too much; I just wanted them to play, not to follow me or each other." Was that instruction made out of confidence or recklessness? One might say reckless if the lineup were other than the seasoned improvisers the leader assembled. Dickey might be best known ...

4
Album Review

Brandon Lopez, Ingrid Laubrock and Tom Rainey: No Es La Playa

Read "No Es La Playa" reviewed by Troy Dostert


Saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and drummer Tom Rainey have made dozens of recordings together, both as a duo and with countless others. But when they teamed up with bassist Brandon Lopez for the first time in 2017, for a live show at Barbès in Brooklyn, all three players recognized that there was something special about their collective alchemy. Although it took a while, the documentation of that partnership is finally here, with No Es La Playa providing a scintillating encounter with ...

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

No Es La Playa

Intakt Records
2022

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Moten/López/Cleaver

Relative Pitch Records
2022

buy

Hyaku: One Hundred...

Libra Records
2022

buy

Ojos De Gato

CAM Jazz
2021

buy

One Hundred Dreams Part 1

From: Hyaku: One Hundred Dreams
By Brandon Lopez

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