This is the second time I’ve had the opportunity to interview Dan Moretti a man of many projects. His current one being the reunion of Brazilia and a 20th anniversary live performance at Chan’s in honor of the 1996 album. Out of print, 100 copies of the CD have been pressed for the occasion.
We also talk about his recent tour in Asia with Nile Rogers and recording in Italy with Piccola Orchestra La Viola. In the 1980s he co-founded Celebration Sound a recording studio in Pawtucket, Rhode Island and has recorded 17 albums to this point.
Although not really a jazz musician there are few guitarists that stand as tall in late 20th Century music as Jorma Kaukonen. A founder of both the Jefferson Airplane and Hot Tuna he has been tremendously influential in electric rock and blues as well as acoustic finger style guitar.
As well as touring solo and with Hot Tuna he also runs the Fur Peace Ranch a music school and concert venue in southern Ohio. He will be performing at the Odeum Theater in East Greenwich, RI on March 6, 2016. (in the interview I misspoke and said Odeon)
This is the 25th interviews that I have posted on Jazz New England it is also the fourth time that I’ve interviewed Greg Abate in the course of two years. His current album Kindred Spirits Live at Chan’s recorded with Phil Woods and the Tim Ray trio was released at the end of January. He has been working on his third recording for Whaling City Sound since the end of last summer.
I always enjoy talking to Greg. He is very gracious with his time and although he tours the United States and Europe regularly he still plays local venues when he is home in Rhode Island.
The recording of this podcast was an experiment. I have heard Greg mention Main Street Coffee in East Greenwich, RI before and I live only a short walk from there. Sometimes interviews can be stiff and awkward so I thought it might be good idea to sit and relax and have a cup of coffee and see where the conversation led. I recorded the conversation with my iPhone using a recording app with good noise cancellation. The sound came out pretty well and only needed a minimal amount of equalization. The interview went well too. The only problem being that the conversation was maybe too relaxed and I had edit to find the more focused parts of the conversation for the podcast.
We talked about writing music, Greg’s sextet performance, touring in the UK and his musical favorites and influences.
The sextet gig that We talk about has passed. We also talked about the reunion of Dan Moretti in Brasilia featuring Greg Abate which will take place April 9th at Chan’s in Woonsocket, RI.
It’s perhaps fitting that this is my first two part podcast considering that I’m interviewing is Jon Lundbom whose current project is a four-part EP release. Although Jon moved to Austin Texas about a year ago, the album was recorded last fall in New York with his group the Big Five Chord.
We talked about the group, which has recorded seven other albums since 2003 and other projects (Merle and the Hagards, Baltobom). We also talked about playing jazz in Austin and his philosophy of putting recording projects and music together.
Newvelle Records is a new vinyl only record label Launching in the spring of 2016. Using a curated subscription model the first years crop of six albums includes such artists as Jack DeJohnette, Noah Preminger, Frank Kimbrough, Ban Alison & Don Friedman. A series of albums for 2017 is already in the planning stages.
I expected my interview with co-founder Elan Mehler to be all about business and marketing demographics. Instead we had a long conversation about finding an economic vehicle to create a high quality product and empower artists. Artists retain the ownership of the masters and may release them later as they see fit after a waiting period.
A KIckstarter Campaign is underway for the first years pressings here.
Born and bred in New York of Cuban and Colombian descent pianist Oscar Perez recently released his third album Prepare a Place For Me. His music has been called Post Latin although I get the feeling that he really doesn’t like the term. To him genre is a continuum that he uses to shape his music. More straight ahead jazz than his previous work the new album is infused with an afro-cuban feel in a more cooked down and basic way.
We talked about: genre, balancing his life and music, the musicians he plays with and large group playing, balancing entrepreneurship, music and creativity. Oscar is articulate and easy to talk to and we covered a lot of territory.
Well known in the New England free improvisation community vibraphonist Ryan Kowal has assembled an amazing discography of ten recordings in the last six years. His most recent project is Hub Alignment with his group Meeting of the Minds, featuring noted boston saxophonist Charlie Kohlhase with Kit Demos, Phil Mazza and Ben Dicke. Another project is Dusty Frames a duo with guitarist Patrick Galagan.
This podcast includes a live recording of Meeting of the Minds from AS220 in Providence from June 2015.
The release celebration of Greg Abate’s live album Kindred Spirits was supposed to reprise the original event where it was originally performed, at Chan’s in Woonsocket, Rhode Island featuring Phil Woods and the Tim Ray Trio. It will now go on as a quartet. Three weeks before the release Mr. Woods announced his retirement from music for health reasons followed yesterday by his death.
Greg sat at a piano and talked about Phil Woods, writing music, his next album and his career in general.
Jon Irababon has two very different new albums. On Behind the Sky he shows off his skills and compositions in a more mainstream direction featuring Tom Harrell on several tracks. Inaction is an Action is an exploration of the solo sopranino saxophone and is in a much more avant gard vein. The juxtaposition of the two in a dual release covers much more area than either of them could alone showing off a versatile musical personality.
Jon has the virtuosity and vision to be a defining saxaphone figure of the twenty-teens. He is a regular member of: Mostly Other People Do the Killing, Barry Altschul’s 3dom Factor, The Dave Douglas Quintet, The Mary Halvorson Octet and more.
A Coloradan by way of Virginia and New York Josh Maxey has released nine albums in the last three years. Celebration of Soul released in August is his tenth.
The organ trio is the chosen vehicle for his guitar voice. He plays jazz infusing the feeling and power of the blues. His influences include John Coltrane and Jimmy Page and although he plays songs he loves to smear them together into extended suites.
This is the second time I’ve had the opportunity to interview Dan Moretti a man of many projects. His current one being the reunion of Brazilia and a 20th anniversary live performance at Chan’s in honor of the 1996 album. Out of print, 100 copies of the CD have been pressed for the occasion.
