Rob Pronk and The Metropole Orkest [Orchestra]

© -  Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

Sometimes using words to describe Jazz becomes a heavy burden.  It is an impossible task to begin with, fraught with limitations and can become a distraction to the point where the music is objectified and no longer something to be subjectively enjoyed.

So every so often, the editorial staff at JazzProfiles makes it a point to stop, look and listen to the music.

In this regard, we have put together three video slide montages that feature performances that were part of Rob Pronk’s 75 birthday celebration.

Rob had a long career as a brilliant arranger, composer and director of The Metropole Orchestra of The Netherlands.

The birthday broadcast took place on June 1, 2003 at the Broadcast Music Center in Hilversum, The Netherlands. It was re-broadcast on February 11, 2008 on NPS Radio 6 [The Netherlands] as part of the program - “In Concert: The Bands.”

Bassist, composer, arranger John Clayton was flown in from the United States to direct The Metropole Orchestra as were tenor saxophonist Pete Christlieb and trombonist Andy Martin as principal soloists

A total of seventeen of Rob’s charts [arrangements] were performed that evening, three of which are used as soundtracks to the accompanying videos so that you will have the opportunity to stop, look and listen to a portion of the excellent orchestral Jazz from this once-in-a-lifetime concert.

The first tune is Peace by Horace Silver which features the superb trombonist and bass trumpeter, Bart van Lier.

The second tune highlights Pete Christlieb on tenor sax performing Billy Strayhorn’s Raincheck.

The third song is a stunning arrangement of Bill Evans’ Waltz for Debby with Arlia de Ruiter as the violin soloist.

Domenico Sanna and Alfonso Deidda - Two More from Via Veneto Jazz and Jando Music

© -  Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

The editorial staff at JazzProfiles closes its week-long visit with the latest releases by Via Veneto Jazz as co-produced by Jando Music by bringing to your attention the music of two musicians who are part of the current Italian Jazz scene: pianist Domenico Sanna and multi-reed player Alfonso Deidda.

The first of these is Brooklyn Beat [VVJ 095] and it features the piano and Fender Rhodes artistry of Domenico Sanna with bassist Ameen Saleem and drummer Dana Hawkins. The CD offers ten [10] tracks all of which are Sanna originals except Jaki Byard’s D.D.J.L. and an evergreen from the Great American Songbook - Body and Soul.

Although this is only the second CD under his own name, Sanna is a seasoned musician having performed with Dave Liebman, Rick Margitza, Jeff Ballard, Larry Grenadier, Steve Grossman, Scott Coley, Joe Lovano, Peter Bernstein, Roberto Gatto, Stefano Di Battista, Flavio Boltro, Maurizio Giammarco, Dario Deidda.

Jaki Byard is a great starting point in describing Domenico’s style although one could also reference Paul Bley, Herbie Nichols, Andrew Hill and even, a somewhat contained, Cecil Taylor.

Sanna plays in a deeply linear manner and the path for his musical logic is rooted in harmonic substitutions. He evokes moods and pulses and atmospheres. He music can swing in a strictly metronomic sense, but that’s not the effect he is trying to achieve. He wants to explore new directions and, in this regard, his originals become points of departure for new and different excursions into melody, harmony and rhythm.

The net effect is to create, along with the very capable assistance of bassist Saleem and drummer Hawkins, a new sonority or texture for the piano-bass-drums Jazz trio. The sound is one that could be labeled a Jazz noir, but without recourse to or heavy emphasis on the blues.

Domenico Sanna’s is an original voice, but as yet, not an easily identifiable one nor one that is fully matured in a Jazz sense. It will be interesting to hear where he takes all of this in terms of future recordings.

The following audio track showcases the Domenico Sanna trio on Jaki Byard’s D.D.L.J.

The contemporary tone of the music set in Domenico Sanna’s Brooklyn Beat continues in Alfonso Deidda’s Lucky Man [VVJ 097].

Deidda plays all the saxes as well as bass clarinet and on his premier recording for Via Vento Jazz and Jando Music on which he is joined by the stellar trumpet player Fabrizio Bosso, Julian O. Mazzariello on piano, Dario Deidda on bass and Alessandro Paternesi on drums.

Here again the program is made up of ten [10] tracks but this time they are all original compositions as penned by Alfonso.

Deidda style, particularly on tenor sax, brings to mind Sam Rivers, Wayne Shorter and George Coleman and his writing is very straightforward which allows for a great deal of interplay with the other instruments.

Modes, unusual time signatures, quasi-Rock beats, repetitive vamps, and uncommon harmonies notwithstanding, Alfonso’s music has a sensitive and expressive quality to it that keeps the listener engaged.

The musicianship throughout is first rate and the solos by each member of the quintet are all artfully constructed and interesting to follow; they have a narrative nature about them, albeit an abstract one.

You can sample all of these aspects of Alfonso Deidda’s music on the following audio track that features his original composition Arahuacos from Lucky Man [VVJ 097]. The tune is in 5/4 which you can count as a straight 1-2-3-4-5 or as 1-2-3, 1-2; 1-2-3, 1-3 [one bar of ¾ and one bar of 2/2].

More information about Via Veneto Jazz can be found on its website - http://www.viavenetojazz.it/index.html. Via Veneto Jazz’s latest releases can be acquired through www.forcedexposure.com. You can also find its music at Amazon.com both as CD’s and Mp3 downloads and through Marco Valente’s online retail source - www.jazzos.com.  

Max Ionata and Dado Moroni - "Two for Stevie"

© -  Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

“The Jazz duo is an affirmative exercise in self-denial, a musical fast in which one gives up some expected ingredient in the cause of the greater good; intimacy, freedom, self-exploration, name your poison. Without the ballast of a beat, the emptiness leaves the duo in the back alley of the experimental where expectations are discouraged.”

- John McDonough, Down Beat

When I took a quick look at the title of the latest Via Veneto Jazz - Jando Production CD entitled Two for Stevie [VVJ 096] I thought that tenor and soprano saxophonist Max Ionata and pianist Dado Moroni [who also plays some bass of this recording] had dedicated an album to me!

But after closer review, I realized that the “Stevie” referenced in the CD title was composer and keyboard artist Stevie Wonder and not me. Over the last quarter of the 20th century, Stevie Wonder composed a host of songs so recognizable and broadly popular that a few notes from their melodies brings immediate recognition. To say that the music of Stevie Wonder is universally revered would be an understatement.

Even those of us whose singing in the shower can make ceramic tiles crack can effortlessly sing or hum along to the following lyric of Stevie’s smash hit - You Are The Sunshine of My Life:

“You are the sunshine of my life,

that’s why I’ll always be around.

You are the apple of my eye,

Forever you’ll stay in my heart.

I feel like this is the beginning,

‘though I’ve loved you for a million years.

And if I thought our love was ending,

I’d find myself drowning in my own tears.

Whoa, whoa.

You are the sunshine of my life,

that’s why I’ll always stay around.

You are the apple of my eye,

Forever you’ll stay in my heart.

You must have known that I was lonely,

because you came to my rescue.

And I known that this must be heaven,

how could so much love be inside you?

Whoa.

You are the sunshine of my life,

that’s why I’ll stay be around.

You are the apple of my eye,

Forever you’ll stay in my heart.”

By way of additional background on the project, Via Veneto Jazz and Jando Music, the co-producers of the CD, sent along the following media distribution on their latest release.

“After their Ellington tribute record - Two for Duke [VVJ 077] - Dado Moroni and Max Ionata are back together again in a project dedicated to another music icon: the legendary and incomparable Stevie Wonder (who, by no coincidence, wrote a tribute song Sir Duke for Ellington and musicians who influenced his work).

Considered one of the most prominent artists in the history of black music, Stevie Wonder built the foundation for the evolution of soul and R&B, thanks to his personal style, resulting from an infusion of pop, funk, reggae and jazz.

With jazz as their starting point, Dado and Max embark on an explorative quest of the "wonderful" Stevie,  playing his best-loved,  international hit songs in an innovative and distinctive style.

Produced by Jando Music, in collaboration with Via Veneto Jazz, the Two for Stevie [VVJ 096] retraces the stages of Stevie Wonder’s formidable artistic career:  from the enormous success of Songs In The Key of Life to the enchanting melodic effusiveness of  Hotter than July….

The intriguing interplay between Moroni’s piano and double bass and Ionata’s sax are featured on the following tracks:

> 1) Overjoyed (Stevie Wonder)

> 2) Don’t You Worry ‘bout a Thing (Stevie Wonder)

> 3) Isn’t She Lovely (Stevie Wonder)

> 4) I Wish (Stevie Wonder)

> 5) Chan Song (Herbie Hancock – Stevie Wonder)

> 6) Love’s in Need of Love Today (Stevie Wonder)

> 7) Have a Talk with God (Stevie Wonder)

> 8) Send One Your Love (Stevie Wonder)

> 9) You Are the Sunshine of My Life (Stevie Wonder)

> 10) The Secret Life of Plants (Stevie Wonder)

> 11) Ribbon in the Sky (Stevie Wonder)

You can locate the previous JazzProfiles feature on Two for Duke by going here.

More information about Via Veneto Jazz can be found on its website - http://www.viavenetojazz.it/index.html. Via Veneto Jazz’s latest releases can be acquired through www.forcedexposure.com. You can also find its music at Amazon.com both as CD’s and Mp3 downloads and through Marco Valente’s online retail source - www.jazzos.com.  

The following audio-only music file features Max and Dado on Stevie Wonder’s - You Are The Sunshine of My Life.

Paolo di Sabatino - Distant Look

© -  Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

Paolo di Sabatino is a 45-year old pianist who, like guitarist Fabio Zeppetella, the subject of one of our earlier features about Via Veneto Jazz/Jando Music recording artists, also hails from Bari, which is located on the extreme southeastern coast of Italy.

Paolo has an extensive background which includes numerous recordings, club and concert appearances all of which you can find out more about with a visit to his website. The site has an English translator.

I was unfamiliar with Paolo’s playing until I had the opportunity to sample it on his latest CD which is entitled Distant Look [Via Veneto Jazz/Jando Music VVJ 085].

On this recording, Paolo is joined by Luca Bulgarelli on bass and his brother, Glauco, on drums.

Of the ten tracks that make up the CD, seven are originals, two are ballads from the Great American Songbook - Skylark and Close Enough For Love - and one is a Jazz standard - Bud Powell’s Tempus Fugit.

On five of the tracks, the Jazz-Rock fusion guitarist John Abercrombie lends his talents to give the music a contemporary quality.

What made the greatest impression on me as I listened to this recording was the originality of di Sabatino’s conception; he doesn’t play Jazz piano the way I’ve ever heard it played before.

He comes at it from many new and different angles, which is not to say that it is angular in the sharp or jagged sense of that world. He blends all of these personal and distinctive approaches to improvisation around a strong sense of melody.

Having the two tunes from the Great American Songbook and Bud Powell’s Jazz standard on the recording was helpful in providing me with a musical compass to help me navigate through Paolo’s approach to Jazz.

Di Sabatino was born in 1970 and began performing about 20 years later. For him, the influence of Jazz-Rock fusion, the use of electronic instruments instead of acoustical instruments, Free Jazz, unusual time signatures and many other aspects that were “new” to the modern Jazz generation of the post World War II years were established and ensconced in the Jazz of his generation.

It wasn’t a question of the viability of these new trends and styles, it was more of question of them already being incorporated to what Paolo was hearing during the developmental phase of his journey into Jazz and then building his own approach around them.

The presence of John Abercrombie, a Jazz-Rock fusion guitarist whose work dating back to the 1974 Timeless CD with Hammond B-3 organist and synthesizer player Jan Hammer and drummer Jack DeJohnette and whose 1975 Gateway CD with bassist Dave Holland and DeJohnette [both of ECM] has given him almost iconic status is not a happenstance. In a sense, Abercrombie’s music is a reflection of di Sabatino returning to his roots.

For those of us with Jazz preferences which were developed a generation or two ago, I think it is important to listen to what the more recent artists are contributing to the evolution of Jazz.  It’s not always easy because contemporary Jazz is not always palatable in its current forms. Artists like Paolo di Sabatino make it easier to bridge gap because they in a sense have already done this work of synthesis.

Judge for yourself by listening to the following audio-only track of Tempus Fugit from Paolo di Sabatino’s Distant Look [Via Veneto Jazz/Jando Music VVJ 085].

More information about Via Veneto Jazz can be found on its website - http://www.viavenetojazz.it/index.html. Via Veneto Jazz’s latest releases can be acquired through www.forcedexposure.com. You can also find its music at Amazon.com both as CD’s and Mp3 downloads and through Marco Valente’s online retail source - www.jazzos.com.  

Dado Moroni - "Five for John" [Via Veneto Jazz/Jando Music]

© -  Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

In many ways, pianist Edgardo “Dado” Moroni has earned the reputation of being one of the most distinguished members of the Italian Jazz community, let alone, a musician of stature on the International Jazz scene.

He has performed with such Jazz luminaries as Clark Terry, Jimmy Woode, Freddie Hubbard and Ray Brown along with a host of Jazz musicians who are his contemporaries such as George Robert, Tom Harrell, Bill Goodwin, Joe Locke, Bert Joris and Alvin Queen.  Dado even moved to the U.S. in 1991, becoming part of the New York jazz scene, and appearing regularly both as a leader and sideman, in some of the city's most prestigious clubs, including Blue Note, Birdland, Village Vanguard as well as recording several CDs.

Not surprisingly, Dado has also played with many of the principals in Italian Jazz including Rosario Giuliani, Stefano Bagnoli, Paolo Recchia, Danilo Moccia, Roberto Gatto, Giuseppe Bassi, and Daniele Scannapieco. He’s even made a duo piano CD with another most, admired Italian Jazz pianist - Enrico Pieranunzi!

In 2010 he was appointed Professor of Jazz Piano at Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory of Music in Turin, a position he currently holds.

So what does such an accomplished musician do to celebrate his 50th birthday in 2014?  Of course, Dado selected a stellar cast of musicians to pay tribute to legendary jazz saxophonist John Coltrane and the musical innovations he contributed to the jazz language and recorded an album.

The music was release on CD in February 2014 as Five for John [Via Veneto Jazz/Jando Music 089].

Honoring Trane’s lasting legacy, this album includes some of Coltrane’s best known compositions such as After the Rain, Mr. P.C.  and Naima, the hauntingly beautiful ballad dedicated to his wife, some tunes closely associated with him such as Fred Lacey’s Theme for Ernie, Contemplation by McCoy Tyner and Gershwin’s But Not for Me. Dado contributes two original compositions by Dado Moroni: Sister Something [for which, he no doubt, had Horace Silver’s Sister Sadie in mind] and Mr. Fournier [dedicated to drummer Vernel Fournier who established the now famous Poinciana beat as part of the legendary Ahmad Jamal Trio of the late 1950’s].

Far from a conventional celebration of Coltrane’s work, this project demonstrates the influence of Trane’s singular jazz style which Moroni and his colleagues take in some different directions. The musicians that accompany Dado on this CD are:

Joe Locke: considered by many to be the most gifted jazz vibraphonist of his generation and recipient of many national and international industry and artistic rewards.

Alvin Queen: a true icon and major innovator in the world of jazz drumming  and a pupil of Elvin Jones who was part of John Coltrane’s quartet.

Marco Panascia: an internationally-acclaimed, highly talented bassist and composer, long-time resident of New York City.

Max Ionata: considered among the most important saxophonists in the Italian jazz scene. Highly appreciated particularly in Europe and Japan, his longstanding collaboration with Dado Moroni gave birth to the remarkable 2012 album Two For Duke [Via Veneto Jazz/Jando Music VVJ 077]. You can read the JazzProfiles feature on this collaboration between Dado and Max by going here.

The following audio-only track features Dado’s original composition Sister Something.

More information about Via Veneto Jazz can be found on its website - http://www.viavenetojazz.it/index.html. Via Veneto Jazz’s latest releases can be acquired through www.forcedexposure.com. You can also find its music at Amazon.com both as CD’s and Mp3 downloads and through Marco Valente’s online retail source - www.jazzos.com.