Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Miguel Zenon: Yo Soy La Tradicion

4

Miguel Zenon: Yo Soy La Tradicion

By

View read count
Miguel Zenon: Yo Soy La Tradicion
With You Soy La Tradicion, alto saxophonist Miguel Zenon digs deep into his Puerto Rican roots with an exploration of his take on the "jazz with strings" genre. This is his eleventh CD release as a leader. He dabbled in the approach with Awake (Marsalis Music, 2008), adding a string quartet to his jazz quartet on a handful of the disc's tunes. Yo Soy La Tradition is a purer string/horn experience—just Zenon's golden-toned alto sax joining forces with the Spektral Quartet.

Searching for a touchstone for the sound, tenor saxophonist Stan Getz's Focus (Verve Records, 1962) comes to mind. Focus features Getz with the larger canvas of an orchestra, but the approach—that of full integration of string arrangements with the horn voicings rather than the sax blowing over a subtle backdrop—is the same.

Zenon's take on the folkloric Puerto Rican sound, a mix a African, native and Spanish influences, is mixed with his own ideas and musical history and comes up with a work of superb beauty—sometimes emotional and urgent, other times solemn and reverent.

The shadow of Spanish conquest and its missionary conversion brings the mystery and beauty of the Catholic religion into the brew. "Rosio" draws from "El Rosario Cantado," rooted in the Church's Holy Rosary. It is a shifting, sometimes drifting, sometimes urgent piece of music, with the strings displaying an intense vibrancy. These arrangements are all by Zenon. He has done a masterful job. "Cadenas" brims with a gorgeous intensity. Sax and strings converse in a spirited back and forth.

"Milagrosa," is another free-flowing integration of strings and sax, vivacious and hopeful, painted with a virtuosic fervor; and the set's closer, "Villalbeno," eases the mood into the pensive, with Zenon's alto singing through the cool wash of strings.

Track Listing

Rosario; Cadenas; Yumac; Milagrosa; Viejo; Cadenza; Promesa; Villalbeno.

Personnel

Miguel Zenon
saxophone, alto

Miguel Zenon: alto saxophone; Clara Lyn: violin; Maeve Feineberg: violin; Doyle Armbrust: viola; Russell Rolan: cello.

Album information

Title: Yo Soy La Tradicion | Year Released: 2018 | Record Label: Miel Music

Tags

Comments


PREVIOUS / NEXT



Miguel Zenon Concerts


Support All About Jazz

Get the Jazz Near You newsletter All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.

More

Tramonto
John Taylor
Ki
Natsuki Tamura / Satoko Fujii
Duality Pt: 02
Dom Franks' Strayhorn
The Sound of Raspberry
Tatsuya Yoshida / Martín Escalante

Popular

Old Home/New Home
The Brian Martin Big Band
My Ideal
Sam Dillon
Ecliptic
Shifa شفاء - Rachel Musson, Pat Thomas, Mark Sanders
Lado B Brazilian Project 2
Catina DeLuna & Otmaro Ruíz

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.