Tenor
saxophonist Ian Sims was advised
early in his career that in order to fully captivate your audience, you must
consider a variety of programming. Your material should engage the listener by
presenting different styles and tempos while still maintaining continuity. “Conundrum”
takes the listener on one such empirical journey. For his debut album as a leader,
Sims assembled his band Divergent Paths with a stellar cast of musicians
including Alex Norris on trumpet, Paul Bollenback on guitar, Ed Howard on bass
and EJ Strickland on drums.
As a
veteran purveyor of smooth, moody and sophisticated contemporary jazz,
composer/keyboardist Dan Siegel is an
artist known for instrumental music of high taste and quality. Yet after a
five-year hiatus from recording, he has just created what is easily the most inspired
and meticulously-crafted collection of his career with his milestone 20th
project, “Indigo.” Thirty-plus years past his 1980 debut CD, Siegel quietly
removed himself from the rat race of the recording industry, submerged himself
into his enlarged role as a music educator and gently massaged his creative
musical muse with a non-rushed approach to composing and orchestrating his
latest creations.
Also this
week, drummer Chip White, who has performed
with James Moody, Houston Person, Etta Jones and others, has assembled an
all-star cast including Wycliffe Gordon, Eddie Henderson and Renee Rosnes for “Family
Dedications and More”; Rippingtons’ keyboardist Bill Heller is joined by Eric Marienthal, Jeff Kashiwa and others
for his debut as a leader, “Find the Way”; and pianist Art Hirahara unveils his new trio recording, “Libations and
Meditations”.
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