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Phillip Golub

Phillip Golub (b. 1993) is a pianist, improviser, and composer based in Brooklyn, NY. Originally from Los Angeles, he creates highly original and expressive music, grounded in but not constrained by his engaged practice in jazz, creative music, and new music. Technically audacious, Phillip sublates sound worlds as distant as Thelonious Monk and Alexander Scriabin, the ars subtilior and Cecil Taylor, negating conventions, yet building on traditions.

Phillip’s recordings have been praised as “cutting edge” (Sequence 21) and containing “a profound concept […] triumphant […] fascinating” (Pop Matters). As a player, he has been described as bringing “assurance, charisma, and infectious enthusiasm” (Steve Smith) to his performances and manifesting “exhilarating energy, charisma, and a canny ability to transform the complex and even inscrutable into sophisticated yet joyful noise” (Allmusic.com).

Phillip is in demand as a pianist on New York’s jazz, creative music, and world music stages, performing and recording regularly across numerous sub-genres and scenes, such as Layale Chaker, DoYeon Kim, Lesley Mok, Anna Webber, Jacob Shulman, and Seajun Kwon, at venues such as Roulette, National Sawdust, and many other Brooklyn mainstays.

Phillip has an unwavering commitment to honoring the genealogy of jazz. He has played numerous times with Cecil McBee and worked extensively with Wayne Shorter and esperanza spalding on their opera … (Iphigenia). He continues to play a crucial role in the Shorter estate, digitizing and preparing manuscripts for publication. phillipgolubmusic.com


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Album Review

Phillip Golub / Lesley Mok: Dream Brigade

Read "Dream Brigade" reviewed by John Sharpe


Pianist Phillip Golub and drummer Lesley Mok explore the porous boundaries between form and freedom on their exploratory debut as Dream Brigade, blending spontaneous composition with intuitive interplay in a wide-ranging program of six spontaneous inventions and two dives into the Great American Songbook. An in-demand side person, Mok can be heard in the blue chip ensembles of pianist Myra Melford and reedist Anna Webber, as well as leading the group The Living Collection. Golub's resume includes principals ...

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Radio & Podcasts

Phillip Golub: Recording The Impossible Piano

Read "Phillip Golub: Recording The Impossible Piano" reviewed by Lawrence Peryer


Brooklyn pianist Phillip Golub is taking his music in bold new directions.Phillip's new project, Loop 7 (greyfade, 2025), is a set of minimalist compositions performed on a piano tuned to 22 notes per octave instead of the usual 12. Working with producer Joseph Branciforte, he's created something that lives between acoustic chamber music and studio art.It's a groundbreaking approach--Phillip's performance was captured on a special Yamaha piano in a unique way he tells us about. The ...

Album Review

Phillip Golub: Abiding Memory

Read "Abiding Memory" reviewed by Vincenzo Roggero


Pressoché sconosciuto dalle nostre parti, il poco più che trentenne Phillip Golub è musicista assai attivo nella sempre effervescente scena newyorchese. Eclettico, trasversale, dalla curiosità onnivora si muove con disinvoltura tra jazz, intrighi elettronici, libera improvvisazione e musica da camera, come testimoniano dischi e concerti. Per Abiding Memory si è scomodato un gigante del pianoforte come Vijay Iyer, scrivendone assai lusinghiere note di copertina. E l'ascolto delle dieci tracce conferma appieno l'eccellenza del risultato, perché Abiding Memory è ...

1
Radio & Podcasts

Phillip Golub, Irene Schweizer, and Bill Frisell

Read "Phillip Golub, Irene Schweizer, and Bill Frisell" reviewed by Jerome Wilson


This show features recent releases by Phillip Golub, Sam Anning, and Bill Frisell as well as older work from the San Francisco String Trio, Irene Schweizer, and King Pleasure. Playlist Henry Threadgill Sextett “I Can't Wait Till I Get Home" from The Complete Novus & Columbia Recordings of Henry Threadgill & Air (Mosaic) 00:00 Ezra Weiss Sextett “Don't Need No Ticket" from Before You Know It (Roark) 00:58 Riverside “Demigods" from The New National Anthem (Greenleaf Music) 10:30 ...

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Dream Brigade

Infrequent Seams
2025

buy

Radio Afloat

In the Circle
2024

buy

Abiding Memory

Endectomorph
2024

buy

Shadow Music

ENDECTOMORPH Music
2023

buy

Filters

Greyfade
2022

buy

Axioms // 75AB

Biophilia Records
2020

buy

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