Bill Charlap Bows 'Somewhere': The Acclaimed Pianist's Third CD For Blue Note Records

On March 23, 2004, Blue Note Records will release Bill Charlap's heartfelt tribute to composer, Leonard Bernstein. Somewhere is a passionate and far-reaching exploration into the songs of one of America's greatest composers.

Charlap's 2002 release Stardust, a foray into the Hoagy Carmichael songbook featured special guests Tony Bennett, Jim Hall, Shirley Horn and Frank Wess, refined company indeed. Somewhere continues the youthful pianist's liaison with the standard repertoire. As on his first two Blue Note releases Charlap's musical compatriots, Peter Washington (bass) and Kenny Washington (drums) bring their vast experience and knowledge of the standard and jazz canon to the fore on the stellar new release.

Bill Charlap grew up in a family surrounded by song. His father, Moose, was a renowned Broadway songsmith and mother, singer Sandy Stewart was a charting hit-maker, TV star and first-call session singer for songwriters pitching soon-to-be-classics to the industry. Young Bill couldn't help but be attracted to the joys of a well-turned lyric or a resonant melodic phrase.

The native New Yorker's take on Bernstein is, at once, respectful and daring. Embracing and recontextulizing Bernstein's theatre music, Charlap allows the listener a glimpse into a composer as much at home in a Village jazz club as in the concert hall. Bill Charlap and company provide ample evidence of the flexibility, beauty and timeless strength of this music often thought to be so “through composed" as to be unapproachable from an improvisational perspective.

The pianist's encompassing vision of what song can be has been apparent consistently even as his star has dramatically risen in the past few years with is Blue Note releases. Howard Reich of the Chicago Tribune has written that “Charlap views the piano as an orchestral instrument capable of a broad range of tonal shadings and unusual voices." In the San Diego Union-Tribune, George Varga noted that “Bill Charlap is already one of the most graceful and distinctive pianists in jazz." Of Charlap and his bandmates Gary Giddins enthused in the pages of the Village Voice that the pianist has “created something more than a stellar trio. He has himself a band, a unit, a trinity larger than its parts."