"The story of a painter, a musician, a composer, an artist; music has never been as close to a pictorial work of art as the music of Richard Galliano. The maestro now stands in front of the white canvas, at the Foyer du Theatre du Châtelet..."
Theatre du Châtelet. The temple of Parisian music, just a short walk from the bakns of the Seine. There, in front of his audience, Richard Galliano makes his entrance with only the accordion. Double the responsibility yet double the joy to play in front of his own people.
A festive maze of sounds, that touches the form : jazz, tango French song...waills of blues emerge from the folds of his accordion. Travelling with his compositions, the ones that brought him to perform on stage throughout the world, without forgetting those of Astor Piazzolla, who he has always loved and celebrated in his own way. Yes, because Galliano knows how to shape the material to himself : the teaching of the composer from Mar de La Plata are well visible, but as a starting point, not as a landing place.
Moving, never taking for granted the solutions, always at the service of the melody and the rhythm - principle elements of dance - very attentive to the depth and the form; because, like few artists, Galliano joins technical skill and syntactical knowledge of the music from the 1900s with an uncommon emotionality.
Chat Pitre opens the album, one of the most beautiful pieces written by this accordion player from Cannes, and is followed by Gnossienne 1 and Gnossienne 2 by Erik Satie.
But there is a lot of Italy in his latest "Paris Concert", and not only for the italian label, Cam Jazz, that has realeased this work ( for which Galliano had already recorded the beautiful "L'Hymne à l' Amour", inviting vibraphonist Gary Burton ), but also for his tribute to a very popular Italian song, Caruso, which brought worlwide fame to Lucio Dalla.
And then "Round Midnight" by Thelonius Monk, an artist that Galliano is particularly attached and to whom he has rendered homage many times during his career: a version thought out in absolute respect for the Monkian concept.
If, as Virginia Woolfs writes, in solitude we give passionate attention to our lives, to our memories and the details around us, then this solo album gifts us with a Galliano in his most profound essence, as artist and as a man".
Richard Galliano - Paris Concert ( Theatre du Châtelet )
The Best Is Yet To Come ( The songs of Cy Coleman )
."Cy Coleman was one of the greatest American composers of all time."
-Tony Bennett
The provocative, cutting-edge album The Best Is Yet To Come: The Songs of Cy Coleman features stunning, utterly surprising interpretations of his songs by 12 gifted contemporary female artists: Fiona Apple, Madeleine Peyroux, Missy Higgins, Jill Sobule, Sarabeth Tucek, Nikka Costa, Sara Watkins, Julianna Raye, Sam Phillips, Ambrosia Parsley, Patty Griffin and Perla Batalla. All tracks were fashioned by producer/pianist Dave Palmer.
Cy Coleman was the last major contributor to the Great American Songbook. He s responsible for timeless songs such as The Best Is Yet To Come and The Rules Of The Road made timeless by Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Barbara Streisand, Dusty Springfield, Ella Fitzgerald and Peggy Lee. Ella Fitzgerald won a Grammy for her performance of The Best Is Yet To Come.
Track List
1. The Best Is Yet To Come - Performed by Patty Griffin
2. I've Got Your Number - Performed by Jill Sobule
3. Why Try To Change Me Now - Performed by Fiona Apple
4. I Live My Love - Performed by Madeleine Peyroux
5. Then Was Then And Now Is Now - Performed by Ambrosia Parsley
6. I’m Gonna Laugh You Right Out Of My Life - Performed by Julianna Raye
7. You Fascinate Me So - Performed by Sam Phillips
8. Hey Look Me Over - Performed by Perla Batalla
9. Too Many Tomorrows - Performed by Sara Watkins
10. I Walk A Little Faster - Performed by Fiona Apple
11. Where Am I Going? - Performed by Sarabeth Tucek
12. The Rules Of The Road - Performed by Nikka Costa
13. (I’m) In Love Again - Performed by Missy Higgins
Things About Comin' My Way - A tributo te the music of The Mississippi Sheiks
Recorded and produced by Juno Award winning producer Steve Dawson, in Seattle, Vancouver, Ottawa and New York, this project fulfills a dream of Steve's to pay tribute to the work of this unique and historic group. Between 1930 and 1935, The Mississippi Sheiks were the top selling group of its time, largely due to their hit “Sitting On Top if the World”, also recorded by Cream, Bill Monroe, Howlin’ Wolf and many more. An All-Star cast of internationally renowned artists have all recorded brand new versions of songs by The Mississippi Sheiks. Each track is specifically for this project and does not appear on any other release.
Ranging from traditional to the avant-garde, this tribute stands above others in quality and scope, and features artists well-known in blues, jazz, pop and rock genres. With exclusive recordings by Bruce Cockburn, Madeleine Peyroux, John Hammond, Kelly Joe Phelps, The North Mississippi Allstars, Oh Susanna with Van Dyke Parks, Bill Frisell, Geoff Muldaur, Robin Holcomb, Jim Byrnes, The Carolina Chocolate Drops, and more.
Deadstring Brothers - Sao Paulo
“The band has that ragged blues-meets-country-rock groove down cold, with plenty of slashing guitar work and a rhythm section that could pulverize concrete. They come charging out of the gate with attitude and energy to spare and a relentless mid-tempo thump that never lets up.”
—Harp Magazine
The Deadstring Brothers' heart beats with pure rock and roll. Simple and shor 'nuff. Built on a the unshakable foundations of blues, rock country and soul, DSB manages to create something at once totally fresh but totally recognizable. It's all ragtops and cold beer, seeds and stems, gatefold LPs and foxy girlfriends with tight, flared jeans. You can imagine them walking as a gang down Carnaby street in London in the late 60's, or tearing up the stage at Cobo Hall in De-troit Rock City or sweating buckets at a Muscle Shoals recording session in the 70's.
If mainstream radio played music like the Deadstring Brothers, they wouldn't have to call it classic rock anymore, they'd just call it rock. It's still here, and it sounds as good as ever.
Fronted by guitarist/vocalist and studio magician Kurt Marschke, the Brothers pound out a sound that, in comparison to so much lo-fi indie rock, is full and rich and sounds GREAT blasting out your car window. Joining Kurt in the band are longtime drummer and fellow Detroiter Travis Harrett, and the brothers Cullum---Spencer (guitar, pedal steel and slide guitar) and Jeff (bass). The Cullums, a couple of London lads, came into the Deadstring fold during a UK tour in 2006. Both were mainstays in the burgeoning Heavy Load scene built around a communal love of all things Stones, Crowes and Allmans. It was love at first jam and the boys joined up and bridged the waters between London and Detroit in time to record their 2nd album Silver Mountain.
"If there ever was a band that completely embodied Parsons' idea of "Cosmic American Music" - that indefinable mix of rock and roll, country, blues, soul and gospel - it is Deadstring Brothers."
—The Crimson White
"With breathless urgency, the Brothers give the chilling impression that every note might well be their last, that at any second the car could veer off the edge of the road and explode on the rocks below."
—Detroit Metro Times
It may be a surprise to hear the country rock sounds of Detroits Deadstring Brothers coming from a city better known for loud rock and roll, but disillusionment can take many channels. Desolation, frustration and regret have always been present where great country music was played, and from its bombed-out inner city to its sterile suburbs, Detroit has its share.
Deadstring Brothers began in fall 2003. Since then, the band has worked to develop their own take on the American Sound, drawing influences from a variety of sources. Its all in there somehow, declares Kurt, but blues and country music just feel the most natural.
Not unlike Exile-era Stones, Deadstring Brothers deliver a menacing sound that draws equally on the melancholy of country ballads and the abandon of rock and blues. The bands music is deeply rooted in the storytelling and instrumental traditions of Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, and the American Outlaw Movement, but is also informed by the song structure and understated aggression commonly associated with Detroit bands. Their haunting melodies reveal the influence of early 70s rock icons like The Band and Gram Parsons and The Faces. Deadstring Brothers live performances have the energy of guitar rock, but sophisticated arrangements, Hammond Organ and a focus on traditional American music separate them from many of their Detroit contemporaries.
Tinsley Ellis - Speak No Evil
Over the course of 11 albums and literally thousands of live performances, Ellis has become one of today’s most electrifying guitarists and vocalists. He attacks his music with rock power and blues feeling, in the same tradition as his Deep South musical heroes Duane Allman and Freddie King and his old friends Derek Trucks and Warren Haynes. Rolling Stone says he plays “feral blues guitar...non-stop gigging has sharpened his six-string to a razor’s edge...his eloquence dazzles...he achieves pyrotechnics that rival early Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton.”
SPEAK NO EVIL is the most guitar-driven album of Ellis’ storied career. It features his fiercest, most brutally honest and hardest-hitting original songs to date. The soulfulness and expressiveness of his guitar playing are ferocious, but when the mood calls for it, can be gentle and melodic. Ellis pours his soul into each and every performance with unguarded, raw emotion. With rip-roaring songs that are both poignant and humorous, SPEAK NO EVIL is as wide-ranging and inspired a recording as Ellis has ever made, and one of the most satisfying Southern blues-rock albums in ages.
Tinsley Ellis wears his Southern roots proudly. Born in Atlanta in 1957, he grew up in southern Florida and first played guitar at age eight. He found the blues through the back door of British Invasion bands like The Yardbirds, The Animals, Cream, and The Rolling Stones. He especially loved the Kings — Freddie, B.B. and Albert — and spent hours immersing himself in their music. His love for the blues solidified when he was 14. At a B.B. King performance, Tinsley sat mesmerized in the front row. When B.B. broke a string on Lucille, he changed it without missing a beat, and handed the broken string to Ellis. After the show, B.B. came out and talked with fans, further impressing Tinsley with his warmth and down-to-earth attitude. By now Tinsley’s fate was sealed; he had to become a blues guitarist. And yes, he still has that string.
Already an accomplished teenaged musician, Ellis left Florida and returned to Atlanta in 1975. He soon joined the Alley Cats, a gritty blues band that included Preston Hubbard (of Fabulous Thunderbirds fame). In 1981, along with veteran blues singer and harpist Chicago Bob Nelson, Tinsley formed The Heartfixers, a group that would become Atlanta’s top-drawing blues band. Upon hearing Live At The Moonshadow (Landslide), the band’s second release, The Washington Post declared, “Tinsley Ellis is a legitimate guitar hero.” After cutting two more Heartfixers albums for Landslide, Cool On It (featuring Tinsley’s vocal debut) and Tore Up (with vocals by blues shouter Nappy Brown), Ellis was ready to head out on his own.
GEORGIA BLUE, Tinsley’s first Alligator release, hit an unprepared public by surprise in 1988. Critics and fans quickly agreed that a new and original guitar hero had emerged. “It’s hard to overstate the raw power of his music,” raved The Chicago Sun-Times. Before long, Alligator arranged to reissue COOL ON IT and TORE UP, thus exposing Tinsley’s blistering earlier music to a growing fan base.
Tinsley’s subsequent releases — 1989’s FANNING THE FLAMES, 1992’s TROUBLE TIME, 1994’s STORM WARNING, and 1997’s FIRE IT UP — further expanded the guitarist’s hero status. By now his talents as a songwriter equaled his guitar prowess, and critics, writers, radio programmers and fans around the country were taking notice. Features and reviews ran in Rolling Stone, The Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, and in many other national and regional publications. His largest audience by far came when NBC Sports ran a feature on Atlanta’s best blues guitarist during their 1996 Summer Olympic coverage, viewed by millions of people all over the world.
After one album for Capricorn and two for Telarc, Ellis returned to Alligator in 2005 with the searing guitar-fueled LIVE-HIGHWAYMAN. It was the live recording his fans had been demanding for years. Recorded at a packed club just outside Chicago, the CD took Ellis’ extended soloing and heartfelt vocals to staggering heights. His return to the studio in 2007 produced MOMENT OF TRUTH, an album The Chicago Tribune called “incendiary and inspired.”
Averaging over 150 live shows a year, Ellis has played in all 50 states, as well as Canada, Europe, Australia and South America. He has shared stages with almost every major blues star, including Stevie Ray Vaughan, Otis Rush, Willie Dixon, Son Seals, Koko Taylor, Albert Collins and many others. Whether he’s out with his own band or sharing stages with major artists like Buddy Guy, The Allman Brothers, Gov’t Mule or Widespread Panic, he always digs deep and plays, as Guitar Player says, “…as if his life depended on it.” With SPEAK NO EVIL and continued non-stop touring, Ellis will bring his monumental guitar work and intensely powerful vocals to rock and blues fans all over the world, letting his songs and his guitar do the talking.
John Tchicai Lunar Quartet - Look To The Neutrino
Approaching jazz from a wide scope, Afro-Danish American John Tchicai is a composer/saxophonist whose music is internationally known for its compelling sense of rhythm, drama and humor, its freedom, spirituality, healing qualities and ultimate freshness. He recorded with both John Coltrane ("Ascension") and John Lennon ("Life with Lions"), founded ensembles like "New York Art Quartet", "Cadentia Nova Danica" and "John Tchicai & the Archetypes"; he has composed for jazz & classical ensembles and he records, tours and teaches continuously. John Tchicai is the first recipient of a lifetime grant for Jazz performance from the State of Danmark.
"It is not often one meets a person in the music-business who menage to combine three very different activites into one but that is the case with Enzo Carpentieri. He is able to be the perfect host, an organizer of concerts and at the same time a top notch drummer who can make his drumset sound as if he didn't do anything else the whole day. I first Enzo the 2nd of June 2006 at the Zero Zero Jazz Festival in Abano, where I was doing a workshop and the day after a duo concert with pianist Greg Burk. Now in 2008 Enzo invited me for more surprises. There was a concert with the group "Dolphiana" that I didn't know at all, which became a very inspired me. Then some days after, we started recording the material for the present Cd with Enzo on the drumset, my man and co-composer Greg Burk on the piano and with bassist marc Abrams who Enzo and Greg already knew and spove very highly of, and they were right. Mark was exactly the man needed to make the group a harmonious unity with his optimistic and flexible attitude which is a must in the creative improvisational encounters of today.
John Tchicai
Jack Bruce & Robin Trower - Seven Moons Live
Jack Bruce and Robin Trower for the first time performing live! The news spread like wildfire, the sensation was perfect.
The legendary Cream bassist and singer, all his life striking new paths in blues and jazzrock, and the immense talented guitarist of Procol Harum fame who left the chains of 5-minute-pop behind him very early and who never followed any mainstream cliches: Both musicians have written history in rock for more than 40 years.
It was at the beginning of the 80s when they first worked together in a studio with two remarkable records resulting (B.L.T. 1981 and Truce 1982), but the fans had to wait for another meeting of the titans 27 long years: It was not until last year when "Seven Moons" came out.
The Veterans had formed a power trio; together with the a few years younger drummer Gary Husband (Level 42, Gary Moore, John McLaughlin), they recorded exclusively own material. Trower had come up with some basic ideas and Bruce and he worked them out: Fine bluesrock painted in psychedelic colours und wonderful sounds - a record transporting the living spirit of the creative seventies in to the third millennium. "Seven Moons" is the third joint venture of two aged musicians - and it is their masterpiece.
A few months later a fansite announced: "Bruce, Trower & Husband to take ´Seven Moons´ into orbit! For a few nights only, Robin and Jack will get to play live together for the first time ever in late February 2009."
As a matter of fact: After only two gigs - Karlsruhe and Cologne - the trio was ready to play the dutch town Nijmegen, where the concert would be filmed by a big camera crew. Fans from France, England, Germany and elsewhere arrived in order to enjoy the event together with the dutch devotees of the band.
Somebody placed a notice in the fanblog: With cameras filming the event it might be guaranteed that Bruce, Trower and Husband would play a good concert. Well, this night had something really special, but not because of the camera crew and their equipment. It was only the third joint venture show of the trio, but these guys had found out something meanwhile: They belonged together. They formed a unity. Moments like these bring joy, joy of playing (musicians and footballers know that for sure). You don´t need cameras then.Let´s take a look into the concert.
It´s 8:45 pm. The historic night at the mighty and majestic Concertgebouw De Vereeniging begins on the tick. Jack Bruce, 65 meantime, greets the audience with a short "Good evening" and the band jumps off with the title track of "Seven Moons". Four minutes later the first solo from Robin´s axe, who ist just a little younger than Jack. Both have become lined with age, but it seems as if they will never make old bones. Bruce´s delight about the fascinating little solo is written in his face; Trower notices that he´s doing more than a good job and is all smiles. Solo finished, rhythm change and the trio sets off for the next song, the bluesy "Lives Of Clay". Some time later Bruce makes a little comment with understatement: "Now we are beginning to get somewhere."
They are going to play nearly the whole "Seven Moons" album, they will present a wonderful and easy going version of "Carmen", a song from ways back, off the "B.L.T." album, not as glassy as in 1981 but soulful, very deep. And you bet, there are the signature tunes from Bruce´s famous catalogue. "Sunshine Of Your Love", the song with the legendary bass riff. Here Trower stays true to his own way of playing, no way a Clapton copy but a confident collector of melodies working on his WahWAh without any gimmickry at all. And this version of "White Room" with the "white Hendrix", as they call Robin in the U.S.A., hasn´t ist been remade into something secial here? The bonus "Politician" shows his full artistry during a great solo.
It´s not only striking in what a laid-back way the trio work the themes of this evening, considering that Nijmegen is only the third live show they have staged together so far. To share the joy the musicians show while performing makes this DVD a document of classic, everlasting rock music. Having Jack Bruce on stage again after some heavy blows of fate is particularly heart warming, the more so as he is laughing away at things. What does the scot tell who´s ever so economical in his choice of words? "It is fantastic to be here. For me personally ist is fantastic to be anywhere, actually..." It feels good to have musicians of that kind among us.
Jan Garbarek Group - Dresden
-Jan Garbarek: soprano and tenor saxophones, selje flute
-Rainer Brüninghaus: piano, keyboards
-Yuri Daniel: bass
-Manu Katché: drums
This one is very eagerly-awaited: it has been six years since Jan Garbarek’s last album as a leader (“In Praise of Dreams”). And, moreover, this double-album – recorded in Dresden’s Alter Schlachthof in October 2007 – is also the first-ever live set from the highly-popular Garbarek Group. The band, now including Brazilian bassist Yuri Daniel, powers through repertoire old and new, and the Norwegian saxophonist is in top form, his exchanges with Manu Katche’s bold, emphatic drums particularly exciting. Material includes “Twelve Moons”, “There Were Swallows”, “Voy Cantando”, an ecstatic version of “Paper Nut” (last heard on Shankar’s “Song for Everyone”) and much more.
The new group tackles its repertoire head-on; with the interaction between Jan Garbarek and drummer Manu Katché at the centre of the music. Yuri Daniel, a Brazilian bassist living in Portugal whose previous associations have ranged from Maria João’s group to the Lisbon Underground Music Ensemble, helps to anchor the pulses and rhythm patterns. Rainer Brüninghaus, a Garbarek Group member since 1988, maintains his long-established role as colourist-in-action. While both bassist and keyboardist claim their own solo space, more often they help to shape a climate in which Garbarek’s hymnic, declamatory and intensely melodic solos can find full expression, drawing energy also from Katché’s hard-driving drums. As The Guardian wrote of the group on this leg of the 2007 tour, “The contrast between an intense jamming sound and the songlike simplicity of the tunes is always Garbarek’s magic mix, but this version of the band has an exhilarating intensity.”
Watermelon Slim - Escape From The Chicken Coop
Bill "Watermelon Slim" Homans has built a remarkable reputation with his raw, impassioned intensity. HARP Magazine wrote "From sizzling slide guitar...to nitty-gritty harp blowing...to a gruff, resonating Okie twang, Slim delivers acutely personal workingman blues with both hands on the wheel of life, a bottle of hooch in his pocket, and the Bible on the passenger seat." Paste Magazine writes "He's one hell of a bottleneck guitarist, and he's got that cry in his voice that only the greatest singers in the genre have had before him."
The industry agrees on all fronts. Watermelon Slim & The Workers have garnered 17 Blues Music Award nominations in four years including a record-tying six in both 2007 & 2008. Only the likes of B.B. King, Buddy Guy and Robert Cray have landed six in a year and Slim is the only blues artist in history with twelve in two consecutive years. In Spring 2009 he was the cover story of Blues Revue magazine. Now, Watermelon Slim is making more waves with Escape From the Chicken Coop, his first-person account of the days he spent driving a truck. It is just one of many instances of a life spent changing gears.
Two of Slim's records were ranked #1 in MOJO Magazine's annual Top Blues CD rankings. Industry awards include The Independent Music Award for Blues Album of the Year, The Blues Critic Award and Canada's Maple Blues Award for International Artist of the Year among others. Slim has hit #1 on the Living Blues Charts, top five on the Roots Music Report and debuted in the top ten in Billboard. One of Slim's most impressive industry accolades may be the liner notes of The Wheel Man eagerly written by the late legendary Jerry Wexler who called him a "one-of-a-kind pickin' n singing Okie dynamo." Slim has been embraced for his music, performances, backstory and persona. He has appeared on NPR's All Things Considered, The BBC's World Service and has been featured in publications like Harp, Relix, Paste, MOJO, Oklahoma Magazine and Truckers News as well as newspapers like The London Times, Toronto Star, Chicago Sun-Times, The Village Voice, Kansas City Star, Philadelphia Inquirer, and Michelle Shocked's JAMS Magazine.
The Memphis Flyer led its terrific CD review with the question "Does anyone in modern pop music have a more intriguing biography than Bill "Watermelon Slim" Homans?"
Slim was born in Boston, his father was a progressive attorney and freedom rider and his brother is a classical musician. He was raised in North Carolina listening to the housekeeper sing John Lee Hooker songs. Slim attended Middlebury on a fencing scholarship but left early to enlist for Vietnam. While laid up in a Vietnam hospital bed he taught himself upside-down left-handed slide guitar on a $5 balsawood model using a triangle pick cut from a rusty coffee can top and his Army issued Zippo lighter as the slide.
Slim first appeared on the music scene with the release of the only known protest record by a veteran during the Vietnam War. The project was Merry Airbrakes, a 1973 protest tinged LP with tracks Country Joe McDonald later covered. In the following 30 plus years Slim has been a truck driver, forklift operator, sawmiller (where he lost a partial finger), firewood salesman, collection agent, funeral officiator and at times a small time criminal. Due to aforementioned criminality, Slim was forced to flee Boston where he had played peace rallies, sit-ins and rabbleroused musically with the likes of Bonnie Raitt. Recently Raitt singled out Slim to her audience as a living blues legend during a summer 2009 performance.
From Boston Slim landed in his current home state of Oklahoma farming watermelons - hence his stage name. Somewhere in those decades since Vietnam Slim completed two undergrad and a master's degree, started a family, painted art and joined Mensa, the social networking group reserved for members with certified genius IQs. When he's not on tour Slim loves to fish and at the age of 60 bowls a steady 240 in his local league.
The big turning point was 2002 when Slim suffered a near fatal heart attack. His brush with death gave him a new perspective on mortality, direction and life ambitions and thus his second emergence as a performing musician. Five albums later he says, "Everything I do now has a sharper pleasure to it. I've lived a fuller life than most people could in two. If I go now, I've got a good education, I've lived on three continents, and I've played music with a bunch of immortal blues players. I've fought in a war and against a war. I've seen an awful lot and I've done an awful lot. If my plane went down tomorrow, I'd go out on top." And when you watch him perform, you know every word is true.
Throughout his storied past, it has always been truck driving that Slim returned to. While trucking and hauling industrial waste for thankless bosses at hourly wages to support himself and his family, his id yearned for release of the musician inside. In fact, many of Slim's current songs began a cappella in his rig keeping him awake and entertained. Escape from the Chicken Coup captures those long hours of now and then, finally and cathartically acquiescing to his id.
Watermelon Slim - Vocals, harmonica, bass harmonica, slide guitar, dobro.
Jenny Littleton - Vocals.
Verlon Thompson - Vocals.
Miles Wilkinson - Vocals.
Suzi Ragsdale - Vocals.
Gary Nicholson - Electric, resonator & acoustic guitars.
Steven Mackey - Electric bass guitar.
Kenny Greenberg - Electric guitars.
Stuart Duncan - Fiddle, twin fiddles.
Paul Franklin - Steel guitar.
Darrell Scott - Acoustic guitar, mandolin.
Rob McNeily - Electric guitar.
Rob Neiley - Electric guitar.
Charlie Chadwick - Upright bass.
Kevin McKendree – Grand piano, Wurlitzer, Hammond B-3 organ and keyboards.
Lynn Williams - Drums.
Kevin Malone - Drums.
Producer, Miles Wilkinson
Mixed, Miles Wilkinson
Mastered, Miles Wilkinson
Original recording, Fall 2008 at The Sound Emporium, Studio 2, Nashville, TN
Additional recording at Boulton Farms Studio, Nashville, TN
Francesco Cafiso Quartet - Angelica
The child prodigy has grown and, obviously, has changed. In these last four years since "Happy Time", his first studio album distributed worldwide, Francesco Cafiso has returned to record for Cam Jazz: the new album by Roman Label is entitled "Angelica" and to record it the Sicilian musician went to New York, to Sear Sound studio, where on September 1 and 2 2008 - pianist Aaron Parks, bassist Ben Strett, and drummer Adam Cruz, were waiting for him. "Evidently,, when growing, there is human maturation as wellas musical reflection", says Francesco Cafiso. " And this new album is particular because it reflects the tradition of jazz, to which I always feel tied, but also the desire to move forward". In "Angelica" there are standards which are revisited with modern sensibility by a 20-year-old kid, as well as original pieces. The standards are A Floweris a lovesome thing by Billy Strayhorn, which opens the cd, Peace by Horace Silver, Why Don't I by Sonny Rollins and, certainly not least, the title track, a true Ellington gem.
The young saxophonist says of the standards :" I've always adored Strayhorn and Ellington, from a compositional and musical point of view but also generally speaking : they are both geniuses. I like their tracks because I can play them in my own way. I then decided to do Peace because it is one ot he most beautiful ballads, and Silver, too, is among my favourite composers. Lastly, Why Don't I is one of the pieces that lately I perform live the most". Among the original compositions on "Angelica" is Scent Of Sicily:" It is a homage to my birthplace, with strong references to the traditions of Sicily and, more in general, to the Mediterranean culture". Even bassist Nello Toscano is Sicilian, writer of Winter Sky, a touching and ideal conclusion to the Cd: Nello is my dear friend and Winter Sky is a real beautiful piece. I heard it shortly before going into the studio and fell immediately in love with it". About his "Angelica" album mates Cafiso adds :" All three of them are extraordinary musicians, out ot his world. And super professional. But I was also impressed by their openness, by their ability to the musicians at 360°. They are versatile and can do anything. Playing with Aaron, Ben and Adam was for me an important experience". And from this feeling the album benefited, and album that enchants from beginning to end, and whose listeners discover a new and different Cafiso, always very concentrated onhis limpid alto sax, and even more attentive than before to the musical content.
One of the most precocious talents in the history of jazz. When he was barely nine years old Francesco took his first steps, working with internationally famous musicians.
First of all, veteran jazz critic Ira Gitler was blown away by the young man's incredible set with veteran pianist Franco D'Andrea at the 2002 Pescara Jazz Festival, most of which was issued on the Philology CD Standing Ovation and was described in detail by Gitler in an article written for the Jazz Journalist Association newsletter. Meeting Wynton Marsalis at a laterfestival was a decisive moment for Francesco’s career. Amazed by Francesco’s qualities, Marsalis took him along with his septet on his 2003 European tour, where Francesco performed in prestigious theatres in the largest cities in Europe.
From that moment on, Francesco went through a series of important experiences both in Italy and abroad. He attended the 2004 International Association of Jazz Education in New York City, amazing audiences in his nightly jazz sessions with veterans James Williams (piano), Ray Drummond (bass) and Ben Riley (drums). Phil Woods, who obviously knows the difference between musicianship and press hype, commented to one writer in jest, “I'd like to break his arm!”
He won various important prizes: the Massimo Urbani National Award to Urbisaglia, the EuroJazz Award to Lecco, the International Jazz Festivals Organization Award to New York, the World Saxophone Competition to London, the Django d’Or to Rome and many others.
In order to improve his English, but most of all, in order to experience new musical styles and genres, Francesco went to New Orleans where he played with Ellis Marsalis, Jason Marsalis, Thadeus Richard, Bob Franch, Maurice Brown and many others important local musicians while taking special lessons from Alvin Batiste.
In 2005 the Swing Journal, the authoritative Japanese jazz music magazine, confers him the New Stars Award, prize reserved to the emergent foreign talents. Immediately later, the affirmation in the Top Jazz, referendum of the Italian Music Jazz magazine, that recognizes him as the best new talent of the year.
Francesco performed with a number of great musicians: Hank Jones, Cedar Walton, Mulgrew Miller, Ronnie Matthews, Jimmy Cobb, Ben Riley, Ray Drummond, Reggie Johnson, Doug Sides Lewis Nash, James Williams, Joe Lovano, George Mraz, Joe Locke, Enrico Rava, Gianni Basso, Dado Moroni, Franco D’Andrea and many other Italian and American musicians.
In February 2006 Francesco has achieved the Diploma in Transverse Flute at the Musical Institute V. Bellini in Catania with the Elena Favaron guide and he studies piano jazz.
In 2009 he performed at President Barack Obama's inauguration ceremony guest of Wynton Marsalis' “Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra"
Jeff Healey - Songs From The Road
"Alec Fraser has become my all-around man for the last decade. He's been my engineer for all of my jazz projects, he's been the bassist and engineer for the "Jeff Healey Blues Band", and he shares my interest and enthusiasm as an eclectic listener to many different genres of music. In this band, I always feel like I'm a member, not the leader — just a musician who has an equally important role along with the other players."
— JEFF HEALEY, 2008
I've just spent a lot of time listening to the tapes of our band — from Notodden, the big festival in Norway, the date we played in London, when Jeff's old friend Randy Bachman came onstage to join him, and some tracks recorded at Jeff's club in Toronto.
It's such a flashback; Jeff was on top form, positive, well, and, as always, the rest of us gave him the support he could always rely on.
There are a couple of things that come back to me. One is how exhausted we all were for the Notodden Festival; it was a long series of plane rides, and then a couple of hours in a car with no sleep. However, the minute we hit stage, the tiredness seemed to vanish, and we were all ON, with Jeff leading the way.
As always, his repertoire was as wide as the Mississippi — you'll find some Chicago classics, some old r&b, a taste of psychedelia, and some pop classics from a bygone era — "Teach Your Children Well," "Come Together," and his biggest hit "Angel Eyes."
Whenever we played — in Europe, the U.S. or at home in Canada — Jeff always gave his best, even in the last days when he was seriously ill.
Around the world, thousands of fans will enjoy this CD. I believe Jeff was one of a kind and it's doubtful there will ever be another one like him.
At the very end of the last song, "Santa Bring My Baby Back to Me," Jeff can be heard saying "That was fun, and that's what it's all about."
And so it is.
- ALEC FRASER (producer & bass player)