Baritone saxophonist and bandleader Adam Schroeder teams up with arranger Mark Masters to deliver a tasty baker’s dozen tunes in the Basie/Ellington/Strayhorn style, all composed by renowned trumpeter Clark Terry on CT!. Out January 19, 2024 via Capri Records, the album takes on fresh arrangements of 13 Terry originals.
11
Aug
[ August 18th, 2023 release via Capri Records: Mike Jones, Penn Jillette & Jeff Hamilton – Are You Sure You Three Guys Know What You’re Doing? ]
Pianist Mike Jones leads a unique trio with bassist/magician Penn Jillette and master drummer Jeff Hamilton on a playfully swinging new album Are You Sure You Three Guys Know What You’re Doing?, out August 18, 2023 via Capri Records, is the second album pairing the music director for the Penn & Teller show with his boss
“[On The Show Before the Show,] you’re hearing the unfettered joy in making music. Jones’ all-over-the-keys virtuosity dominates, but Penn is not shy about producing a fat tone and vivid attacks.” – Howard Reich, Chicago Tribune
“[Mike Jones is] a full-keyboard player with an elegant sense of swing and a commanding attack with superb taste in chord voicings, pedal tones and melody lines.” – Marc Myers, JazzWax
05
Nov
[ November the 19th, 2021 release via Capri Records: Jeff Hamilton – Merry & Bright ]
Merry & Bright, drummer Jeff Hamilton’s holiday album featuring his acclaimed trio with pianist Tamir Hendelman and bassist Jon Hamar, is out November 19, 2021 via Capri Records.
The swinging album showcases Hamilton‘s favorite Christmas tunes selected from his memories growing up in a family where everyone gathered around the piano at holiday time to sing in four-part harmony.
15
Sep
[ September 21, 2021 release via Capri Records: Graham Dechter – Major Influence ]
release date: 21.09.2021 via Capri Records
Major Influence, out September 17, 2021 via Capri Records, reunites Dechter with all-star rhythm section Jeff Hamilton, John Clayton and Tamir Hendelman“Los Angeles guitarist Graham Dechter wowed listeners with his 2009 debut as a leader, Right On Time, and he hits it out of the park again with his sophomore release, Takin’ It There.” – Jennifer Odell, DownBeat
“Dechter should be on the scene for many years to come. Only in his twenties, he shows both a skill and maturity that many players don’t find until middle age.”
– John Heidt , Vintage Guitar Hit List
12
Sep
[ September the 17th, 2021 release via Libra Records: Satoko Fujii – Piano Music ]
release date: 17.09.2021 via Libra Records
Pianist-composer Satoko Fujii’s Bold Experiment with Sound Collage and Prepared Piano
“…magical, unfamiliar sounds that can stimulate your sense of wonder and affect your emotions . . .” — Barry Witherden, Jazz Journal
“Fujii’s music troubles the divide between abstraction and realism. Plucking or scraping the strings of the piano; covering them up as she strikes the keys…. All of this amounts to abstract expressionism, in musical form. But it’s equaled by her rich sense of simplicity, sprung from the feeling that she is simply converting the riches of the world around her into music.”
—Giovanni Russonello, New York Times
Pianist-composer Satoko Fujii is often quoted as saying that she “wants to make music no one has heard before.” She more than fulfills that goal on her latest solo album, Piano Music, out September 17 via Libra Records. Using short pre-recorded snippets of her prepared piano music, she edits them together to create a patchwork quilt of unique sonorities. The results are unlike anything she has done before—two extended pieces of otherworldly piano sounds and melodies that evolve so smoothly and organically you can’t tell they’re stitched together from smaller fragments.
09
Sep
[ September the 17th,2021 release via Capri Records: Sheila Jordan – Comes Love: Lost Session 1960 ]
release date:17.09.2021 via Capri Records
“Cheeky, importunate and canny, [Sheila] Jordan’s voice is one of the great standard-bearing instruments of midcentury jazz… she still has that mix of sagacity and ingenuous charm that endeared her to discerning listeners in the 1960s.”
– Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times
“Sheila Jordan is a one-of-a-kind artist who possesses the power to captivate audiences, inviting all to join her on a magical mystery tour of jazz history.” – Roseanna Vitro, JazzTimes
12
Jun
[ June the 18th, 2021 release via Capri Records: The Mark Masters Ensemble – Masters & Baron Meet Blanton & Webster ]
release date: 18.06.2021 via Capri Records
“Mark Masters is an accomplished arranger who comes up with hip, unusual ideas for jazz concerts and recordings.” – Thomas Conrad, JazzTimes
“Masters paints complex, intricate, detailed jazz landscapes, and he has always invited some of the most adventurous and innovative players into his ensemble.”
– Dan McClenaghan, All About Jazz
Featuring veteran trombonist Art Baron, the last trombonist hired by Ellington himself in 1973, the album presents arranger/bandleader Masters‘ fresh, contemporary re-interpretations of Ellington’s iconic 1940-1942 work, when his orchestra featured bassist Jimmie Blanton and tenor sax master Ben Webster.
15
May
[ May 21, 2021 release via Capri Records:Keith Oxman and Frank Morelli – The Ox-Mo Incident ]
release date: 21.05..2021 via Capri Records
“A smoking straight ahead date that is pure fun…one can only hope that there’s more of the same in the offing. Hot stuff.” – Chris Spector, Midwest Record
“If anyone still needs convincing that outstanding jazz players live and work in places other than on the East and West Coasts, they should check out Denver-based Keith Oxman… an excellent improviser with a fine sound, agile technique and sure harmonic sense. He also exhibits a thorough knowledge of the hard bop language and can swing like crazy.” – David Franklin, JazzTimes
“Morelli coaxed the most exquisite tones from his instrument. They were at times husky, gruff and growling, and at others sweet and soaring across three octaves, but always mellow and elegant, like a fine, mature red Burgundy.” – John Farnworth, The Register Guardian
On the album, tenor saxophonist Oxman and bassoon virtuoso Morelli, accompanied by pianist Jeff Jenkins, bassist Ken Walker, and drummer Todd Reid, find unique common ground as jazz meets classical. The two gifted instrumentalists turn the novel conjunction of two strange bedfellows into an intoxicating sound and a charming conversation between like-minded souls.
16
Mar
[ March the 19th,2021 release via Capri Records: Jazz Worms – Squirmin’ ]
release date: 19.03.2021 via Capri Records
“Twenty-five years later and still Denver’s best jazz band.” –Jazz @ Altitude review of Dazzle reunion concert
More than 30 years after the release of their acclaimed debut album, Denver-based quintet the Jazz WORMS make their belated return with Squirmin’, due out March 19, 2021 via Capri Records. Well worth waiting for, the thrilling new session reconvenes all five original WORMS – pianist Andy Weyl, saxophonist Keith Oxman, drummer Paul Romaine, cornetist Ron Miles and bassist Mark Simon – on an invigorating set of all-new material that picks up where the band left off three decades earlier.
10
Jul
[ July the 17th, 2020 release on Capri Records: The Mark Masters Ensemble – Night Talk ]
release date: July the 17th, 2020 via Capri Records
“…masterful…. Leader, arranger, producer, chief cook and bottle washer Masters has crafted nine tremendous settings reminiscent of the work of such creative minds as Marty Paich, Bill Russo, Gil Evans and, say, Gerry Mulligan…. If I don’t hear a better album this year I’ll not complain…. ” – Lance Liddle, Bebop Spoken Here
“Mark Masters is an accomplished arranger who comes up with hip, unusual ideas for jazz concerts and recordings.” – Thomas Conrad, JazzTimes
“Masters paints complex, intricate, detailed jazz landscapes, and he has always invited some of the most adventurous and innovative players into his ensemble.” – Dan McClenaghan, All About Jazz