Recorded in the historic ambience of the Village Vanguard in New York, The Extra Something is not just another release by a prolific artist. Working with a first-class band, Pieranunzi combines core jazz values with a sense of structure and order that comes from classical music, but all of it animated by a strong sense of freedom. Pieranunzi has risen to the ranks of the most significant contemporary musicians, a name to be placed alongside some of the greatest we have seen and heard. The Extra Something contains approximately 60 minutes of original music composed by Enrico Pieranunzi.
2017 release. Two absolutely superb piano players from different musical worlds: Bruno Canino, as a representative of art music, and Enrico Pieranunzi, as a representative of jazz. Two Americas, the Northern one and the Southern one, and some of the greatest composers from both. The Americas project has been conceived for two pianos intertwining like cultures and musical worlds do. Here, between Canino and Pieranunzi, it matters little who is playing "what" and "when". Listening to Americas one is again led to realize that apparent contrasts are actually bonds consisting of irresistible mutual attractions, common points, osmotic relations. Whatever the image this record conjures up in listeners' minds, Americas is definitely great music, confident that culture is not entrenching in what one already knows but breaking conventions, boundaries, mutual inflexibility. Like Bruno Canino and Enrico Pieranunzi did by playing face to face, each backed up by his own strong cultural background and, for this very reason, splendidly creative and versatile.
2018 release. After reaching the bar setting artistic peak with "Bad Hombre" in 2017, the multifaceted Antonio Sanchez continues his evolution with "Channels of Energy", featuring the WDR Big Band with arrangements by world renowned great Vince Mendoza, to satisfy the aspect of his musical personality that is a forum for his astute compositional panache. This album should be thought of as a trio in a sense between Sanchez, the scope of Mendoza's arranging and the WDR Big Band. Vince Mendoza for decades has been one of the most in demand arrangers and composers whose stylistic brush is incredibly wide from pop to jazz.
2017 release. A drum solo by Antonio Sanchez, one of the most sought-after drummers of his generation. The four-time Grammy award winning artist describes the experience an "... experimental project in the sense that it is a complete departure from anything I've ever done in the past as a drummer, composer, producer and engineer. Art is a reflection of life so I took a look at what had been happening in the world, realized that a surprising level of anger, frustration and awareness had been growing in me due to the political situation in the United States. I also wanted to have something that represented my Mexican heritage in a very emphatic way at some point in the album. Taking all these feelings and putting them into the creative process is always very cathartic and playing drums has always been a very meditative and healing ritual for me, so I wanted to develop this project starting with the instrument that has been with me since I can remember. The drum set. I found this project to be one of the most liberating endeavors I've ever set myself to do. Almost like having an alter ego. The Bad Hombre." Recorded in New York at Meridian Studios in October 2016, Bad Hombre contains approximately 55 minutes of music; all tracks written, arranged, produced and performed by Antonio Sanchez.
One of the more difficult aspects of being a modern musician is acknowledging forebears while developing a unique identity. Trumpeter Diego Urcola pays tribute to his heroes and contemporaries on his new recording, APPRECIATION. He shows his recognition not by imitation but through compositions inspired and dedicated to heroes and friends, including Freddie Hubbard, Hermeto Pascoal, Paquito D'Rivera, and Guillermo Klein. Urcola presents his original compositions with the help of an amazing ensemble, featuring pianist Luis Perdomo, bassist Hans Glawischnig, and drummer Eric McPherson.
Diego Urcola's new record, Viva, features the Grammy nominated trumpeter leading an all-star lineup. "I wanted to put together my dream band," said Urcola. The core group of Edward Simon, Avishai Cohen, Antonio Sanchez, and Pernel Saturnino are joined by guests, Paquito d'Rivera, Jimmy Heath, Dave Samuels and Conrad Herwig. "I wouldn't be here if it weren't for Paquito," Urcola says. "He gave me my first big break, and I got to meet a lot of people through him, including Dave, with whom I've been working in the Caribbean Jazz Project for the last three years." Heath was Urcola's advisor for his master's degree at CUNY/City College-Queens College and later an employer in his big band and quintet, while Herwig is a friend via the United Nations Orchestra. Viva features four Urcola originals; two from fellow Argentine composer/big bandleader Guillermo Klein; a pair from another Argentine composer and one of Urcola's best friends, Juan Raffo; a piece by Heath, and the Astor Piazzola classic, "Adios Nonino," a sublime melody the bandoneon master wrote for his father. "I love this tune," says Urcola. "I wrote this arrangement a few years ago for a concert I did with Paquito." on Viva, a sensibility of experimentation is vibrantly apparent throughout. So too is Urcola's aim to integrate his homeland's voice into the jazz idiom. "I like to bring the tango flavor from my country into the mix," he says, then adds, "But foremost I'm a jazz musician."
Like few musicians in the history of music, Kenny Wheeler has been able to make his music a trademark. An approach to his instrument, the trumpet that has marked artistic events for generations of musicians. A sound that transfixes today as it did yesterday and touches whoever comes into contact with this artist. But Kenny Wheeler is more than that. Music at it's purest, an instrumentalist but also as a composer and arranger. And the Long Waiting is a precious gem inside the corpus of the trumpeter's discography. After having measured his composition for string quartet with the album Other People, Wheeler raises the stakes by facing a much larger format: The big band. The result is amazing, unique. A modern writing that embellishes the history of the jazz orchestra. It seems simple, listening to this work with particular attention to the melody, but in Wheeler's themes there is a compositional complexity that only a great craftsman of music is able to construct.
