Giant Step Arts continues the Modern Masters and New Horizons series with the new live album by collective group The Fury, Out December 6, 2024, Live In Brooklyn documents the debut performance of a quartet of some of the most accomplished players in modern jazz with Mark Turner, Lage Lund, Matt Brewer and Tyshawn Sorey.
“It’s rare even in New York City to have a group of four musicians with this kind of deep connection and who are this esteemed to make a live record at an intimate venue like Ornithology in Brooklyn. The audience was thrilled to be in the room as these four masters created, and Giant Step Arts is overjoyed with the results.” – Jimmy Katz
With Live In Brooklyn, Giant Step Arts brings together The Fury, a group comprising four of modern jazz’ truly unique voices for a collective, in-the-moment expression of forward-thinking composition and empathetic interaction.
Super-groups in jazz are a long-standing tradition, going as far back as the many Jazz at The Philharmonic tours or the legendary 1953 concert of Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Bud Powell, Charles Mingus and Max Roach billed as the “The Greatest Jazz Concert Ever.” But it takes more than putting stars on stage for magic to happen. Participants have to put egos aside, bring strong material and be deeply committed to the project. All those factors are evident in this debut recording from The Fury: tenor saxophonist Mark Turner, guitarist Lage Lund, bassist Matt Brewer and drummer Tyshawn Sorey.
Individually, the members of The Fury are highly acclaimed: Sorey the 2024 Pulitzer Prize Winner in Music and a MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant” recipient; Turner, who many mention as the most influential tenor player of the past 20 years; Lund a winner of the Thelonious Monk competition and notable as the first jazz guitar player admitted to the prestigious Juilliard School of Music; and Brewer who began as a 10-year-old prodigy and is one of the great voices on bass for the new millennium.
Lund described the origins of the group. “I have a long history with all of them, but mostly either with Mark, with his band, my band and other situations where we are both sidemen; occasionally with Matt and Mark, like Matt’s record Mythology; a lot with Matt and Tyshawn, like my records and countless New York gigs; but never all of us together so this recording has been something I’d hoped to make happen for a long time. Mark is a formative influence both as a player and composer—I think on all of us—and Matt and Tyshawn are peers in that we are of the same generation but stand out to me as some of the most singular and inspiring voices in music.”
The group’s name, taken from the 1929 William Faulkner novel The Sound and the Fury, was chosen deliberately and democratically, representing, Lund explained, “the passion and grit of the music, which is often misconstrued as intellectual or not folk music, which this very much is.” Despite such an incendiary moniker, the music tends more to the reflective, prioritizing group interplay and development while still leaving room for the members’ individuality. And though Lund mentions precedents with the frontline instruments like Sonny Rollins and Jim Hall, Joe Lovano and John Scofield and Turner’s work with Kurt Rosenwinkel, he emphasized that The Fury is a combination of voices and aesthetics more than specific instruments. The album was recorded in August 2023 at Brooklyn’s Ornithology, one of New York’s great listening rooms, where the music is secondary to nothing. Most of the set list comes from the pen of Lund (three pieces), Turner (a pair) and Brewer (“Of Our Time”). The latter is a lovely ballad highlighted by the way Lund supports Turner’s solo before his own sparkling lead. Turner’s pieces move from the wonderfully jitteriness of “Ender’s Game” to the funky lope of “Sonnet for Stevie”. Lund’s tunes are the meat of the set at tunes four, five and six and are, in turn, anthemic (“Couch”), playful (“Jimbo”) and pastoral (“Vignette”).
With Brewer being a recent member of Sorey’s trio, the pair becomes almost a third joined voice supporting Turner and Lund. As the group progresses, the songs get longer and looser, The Fury becoming The Sound. The results are a strong first statement from a group, which, schedules permitting, will have longevity and is already planning another recording session at the end of 2024. This super-group focuses attention on the second word; as Lund said, “because we’ve all been involved in so many different bands, sometime with very particular and contrasting sounds, I think we all come to each one from a place of earnestness and honesty.” Live In Brooklyn is the latest entry in Giant Step’s new series Modern Masters and New Horizons. Specially curated by trumpeter Jason Palmer and drummer Nasheet Waits, the series features artists who have helped shape the modern jazz landscape along with rising voices doing the same for the next generation. Artists currently slated to contribute include saxophonists Mark Turner, Neta Raanan, Rico Jones, drummer Eric McPherson and the Edward Pérez/Michael Thomas Band.
Giant Step Arts
Founded by Jimmy and Dena Katz in January 2018, Giant Step Arts is an innovative, artist-focused non-profit organization dedicated to commissioning and showcasing the work of some of modern jazz’s most innovative artists. In an
era where it is increasingly difficult for musicians to earn a living, Giant Step Arts offers artists the creative and financial resources to create bold music free of commercial pressure and with total control of their artistic projects.
For the musicians it chooses to work with, by invitation only, Giant Step Arts:
• presents premiere performances
• records these performances for independent release
• provides the artists with digital downloads and CDs to sell; artists retain complete ownership of their masters
• provides the artists with photos for promotional use
• provides PR support for the recordings
Katz says: “Giant Step Arts exists to aid musicians in realizing their artistic dreams. It does not sell music and artists retain full rights to their music. We work tirelessly to raise funds with the goal of helping more musicians.”
Jimmy Katz
Through his award-winning photography with wife Dena Katz and his esteemed work as a recording engineer, Katz has spent nearly 30 years helping to shape the way audiences see and hear jazz musicians. Katz has been part of more than 600 recording projects—many historic—and has photographed more than 200 magazine covers. Whether taken in the studio, in the clubs, on the streets or in the musicians’ homes, his photographs offer intimate portraits of the artists at work and in repose and capture the collaborative and improvisatory process of jazz itself. Recipient of the Jazz Journalists Association award for jazz photography in both 2006 and 2011, Katz’s work has been exhibited in Germany, Italy and Japan. Among the world-renowned artists he has photographed are Sonny Rollins, Keith Jarrett, Ornette Coleman, Freddie Hubbard, Roy Haynes, Cassandra Wilson, Ray Charles, Dave Brubeck, Quincy Jones, Herbie Hancock, Wynton Marsalis, John Zorn, Pat Metheny, and Dizzy Gillespie. His recording credits include such artists as David S. Ware, Joe Lovano, Harold Mabern, William Parker, Benny Golson, Chris Potter, Mark Turner, George Coleman and Jason Palmer, among others.
The Fury – Live In Brooklyn
Giant Step Arts – GSA 15 – Recorded August 2023
Release date December 6, 2024
giantsteparts.org
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