Musicians: Roxana Amed (vocal); Martin Bejarano (piano, synthesizer); Mark Small (tenorsax, clarinet, soprano sax, bass clarinet, flute); Kendal Moore (trombone); Edward Perez (bass); Ludwig Afonso (drums)
Tracks List: A Prayer; Pequeña Voz;:Un Destello; Our Days of Summer; Those Horses Running in the Mist; Climbing Up My Spine; Wild; Then We Built a Home; In This Lonely Room; Una Plegaria; Epílogio.
Roxana Amed, Argentine-American jazz vocalist and composer, presents "Becoming Human" her 11th album produced with the "New Jazz Works" grant by Chamber Music America. With her brilliant ensemble, the three-times Latin Grammy nominee producer shares 10 songs describing poetically and musically the human journey from birth through childhood and youth, through the wilderness of building an identity to the loneliness of an artist, till we return to the silence. These pieces were written by Amed and arranged by Martin Bejerano, Mark Small and Kendall Moore, a team that has been collaborating together for many years now collecting great local and international reviews.
The new album follows last year's Los Trabajos y Las Noches with composer-pianist Frank Carlberg, the latest instalment of a project based on the poetry of Alejandra Pizarnik (1936-72).
Fast forward to Becoming Human. 'Then We Built a Home' is double the length of a number of other album tracks, the album thrives on concision and no matter how brief the pieces their impact is significant.
The experimental 'Pequeña Vox' works well. And if you like the great English singer Norma Winstone's approach then certainly the more probing dimensions that the album goes some way to survey will appeal when the singer uses vocalese to effect. As for actual words the lyrics are very poetical, there's a certain strand of magic realism in their realm - and if you are an English-only non-Spanish speaker chances are you will probably gravitate to 'Our Days of Summer' most, the reverse applies for the Spanish tracks - again the Winstone comparison is meaningful. 'Those Horses Running in the Mist' is probably the track we liked most given its scale and ambition. The electronics and bass riffs on 'Wild' also create a frisson.
Besides Bejerano and Small on the recording there's also trombone from Kendall Moore, bass from Edward Pérez and drums played by Ludwig Afonso. Amed's 11th album - a grant from the New Jazz Works scheme run by Chamber Music America helped pay for the work. Certainly it was money well spent. The song cycle concept follows a journey from birth through childhood and youth towards building an artistic identity. Arrangements are by Bejerano, Small and Moore.
A singer worth getting to know more and more either live or as here on such a luminous work that sends the listener deeply and rewardingly into Amed's own searching and powerful imagination.
Roxana Amed:
Latin GRAMMY® nominee, NARAS® and LARAS® member, Gardel Award winner Roxana Amed is an Argentine-American jazz artist born in Buenos Aires based in the US. Amed is a singular singer-songwriter whose music blends South American folk traditions with art rock and modern jazz. An award-winning vocalist, producer, songwriter and educator, Sony Music recording artist, Amed has been praised by GRAMMY.com for her “artistic vision and understanding of her place in the canon”.
Amed is considered by colleagues, audiences, and critics as one of the most important voices in South American music.
Amed has earned acclaim for her albums with fellow Argentine multi-instrumentalist and former Pat Metheny band member Pedro Aznar, including 2004’s Limbo and 2006’s Entremundos. More albums followed, in 2010’s Cinemateca Finlandesa a duo album with pianist Adrián Iaies (Latin GRAMMY® nominee), Inocencia in 2011, followed by 2013’s La Sombra de Su Sombra with pianist and composer Frank Carlberg featuring the poems of Alejandra Pizarnik. In 2019, she produced Instantáneas an album with live-in-studio performances, including her rendition of Joni Mitchell’s Blue.
In April 2021, she released Ontology which featured her American group with pianist Martin Bejerano, Mark small, Edward Perez, and Ludwig Afonso and found her interpreting songs by Wayne Shorter, Alberto Ginastera, Miles Davis, and original repertoire. It had a significant impact on the international jazz media scene collecting excellent reviews.
In August 2021, she was awarded the “New Jazz Works” grant supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation through Chamber Music America. On September 28th, 2021, her album Ontology received two Latin GRAMMY® Awards nominations for Best Latin Jazz/Jazz Album and Best Arrangement categories. A few months later, this album would won the Gardel Award for Best Jazz Album in 2022 in Argentina, first time in 19 years that a vocalist, female producer receives this award.
On September 16th, 2022, she released Unánime an album dedicated to Latin Jazz with brilliant collaborations by Chucho Valdés, Pedro Aznar, Niño Josele, Chico Pinheiro, among others. It has collected so far fantastic reviews from international jazz media and also received a new Latin Grammy Nomination for Best Latin Jazz/Jazz Album, awards celebrated in Seville, Spain in Novembre 2023, where she also received attention by different international media and was invited to give away awards.
Last June 9th she released Los Trabajos y Las Noches with composer pianist Frank Carlberg, second part of a project based on music written for poems by Argentine Alejandra Pizarnik. It was successfully presented in Joe’s Pub NY last August. This album collected great reviews worldwide and Downbeat gave it 4 stars.
Amed worked on a special project for the CMA grant, that resulted in Becoming human her eleventh album. It is a 10-song cycle that illustrates the human journey and her own experience as an artist. The album will be released by May 2nd 2024 on every platform and will be premiered in NY at the Jazz Gallery and in Miami.
All her albums are released by SONY Music Latin.
She is a Full-time Voice Professor at the prestigious Frost School of Music at the University of Miami.
Viva The Latin Jazz!!
www.jazzcaribeblogspot.com
jazzcaribe2001@yahoo.com
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario