Home » Jazz Articles » Antonio Ciacca
Jazz Articles about Antonio Ciacca
Antonio Ciacca Quintet: Lagos Blues
by AAJ Italy Staff
Nel realizzare il sesto lavoro da leader Antonio Ciacca ha coronato un sogno: incidere un album con la partecipazione del suo mentore Steve Grossman. E Lagos Blues vede protagonista proprio il musicista americano, capace di dar corpo - con alcuni interventi di rara efficacia - a una scaletta che si risolve in sette brani, scelti tra originali e standard. Due i passi a firma del saxofonista: il classico Take the D Train" e la delicata ballad Nicoletta," scritta qualche anno ...
read moreAntonio Ciacca: Lagos Blues (with Steve Grossman)
by George Kanzler
There's a good reason most real" jazz radio stations tend to favor the modern mainstream jazz of the post-bop era codified by such record labels from the mid-20th Century as Blue Note, Columbia's jazz division, Prestige, Riverside and Impulse. It's creative jazz with a comfortingly substantial physicality, clean lines and rhythmic heft still anchored to a swing feel. The excellent Italian jazz pianist Antonio Ciacca is firmly in that modern mainstream, the music here from a quintet, quartet and trio ...
read moreAntonio Ciacca: Lagos Blues
by J Hunter
Four decades ago, Miles Davis called then-burgeoning saxophonist Steve Grossman an important voice in this music." One of the people who heard that voice was pianist Antonio Ciacca. Lagos Blues, Ciacca's second disc for Motema, not only shows Grossman's influence as Ciacca's former teacher; it also includes the now-legendary tenor player's direct influence, as he joins Ciacca's regular quartet for the date.
Ciacca says Grossman once compared his former student's writing style to Horace Silver and Benny Golson. That assertion ...
read moreAntonio Ciacca: Rush Life
by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
Antonio Ciacca Quintet's Rush Life is a welcome and valuable addition to the contemporary jazz catalogue, where it will rest easy, knowing its place. There are bits and pieces throughout the nine tracks that serve as hopeful reminders that the album could have been more provocative than it is. What it lacks is not skill, but a cool distance from the cerebral blueprint that's still very visible. The album isn't heralded as groundbreaking, and it isn't. It is a smart ...
read moreAntonio Ciacca: Bringing People Together Through Swing
by John Barron
Antonio Ciacca knows a thing or two about multi-tasking. The New York-based pianist is a tireless statesman of jazz, composing music for his own small groups, arranging for various big bands and working as Director of Programming for Jazz at Lincoln Center. Adding to all of this, Ciacca and his wife are busy raising five children in the hustle-and-bustle of 21st Century Manhattan.Born in Wuppertal, Germany and raised in Italy, the 40-year-old musician received a formal music education ...
read moreAntonio Ciacca: Rush Life
by John Barron
Italian pianist Antonio Ciacca is the kind of musician who displays his influences without reservation. Steeped in the tradition of bebop and gospel piano, the New York resident is focused on swinging as hard as he can. Evidence of this can be heard on Rush Life, a hard-blowing quintet recording with tenor saxophonist Stacy Dillard, trumpeter Joe Magnarelli, bassist Kengo Nakamura and drummer Rodney Green.
The disc’s nine tracks are a satisfying blend of Ciacca originals and well-worn ... read moreAntonio Ciacca: Ugly Beauty
by AAJ Italy Staff
Un nuovo acquisto per la scuderia diretta da Flavio Bonandrini: si tratta del pianista Antonio Ciacca, qui in compagnia di una ritmica americana. La sua musica si orienta senza inibizioni ai grandi modelli del passato, da Monk a chi ne ha seguito le orme, come Barry Harris e Jaki Byard, maestri di Ciacca. Lo rivela subito nella scelta del titolo del disco ed in una composizione Miriam's Doodles", dall'andamento sbilenco, quasi fosse tratta dal songbook di Thelonious. Ciacca ha acquisito, ...
read more