Download your Maria Schneider programme here [pdf ... - Barbican
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do something different<br />
contemporary summer 08<br />
<strong>Maria</strong><br />
<strong>Schneider</strong><br />
+ Portico Quartet<br />
Wed 9 Jul 7.30pm<br />
www.barbican.org.uk/contemporary<br />
Free <strong>programme</strong>
<strong>Maria</strong><br />
<strong>Schneider</strong><br />
+ Portico Quartet<br />
<strong>Maria</strong> <strong>Schneider</strong> Jazz Orchestra:<br />
<strong>Maria</strong> <strong>Schneider</strong> composer/conductor<br />
Steve Wilson, Charles Pillow,<br />
Rich Perry, Rick Margitza,<br />
Scott Robinson reeds<br />
Greg Gisbert, Jon Owens,<br />
Laurie Frink, Ingrid Jensen trumpets<br />
Keith O’Quinn, Ryan Keberle,<br />
Marshall Gilkes, George Flynn<br />
trombones<br />
Toninho Ferragutti accordion<br />
Carle Vickers trumpet & saxophone<br />
Daniel Hofmann saxophones<br />
Jonathan Bradley trumpet<br />
Guitar Jack Wargo lead guitar<br />
Rudy Copeland Hammond B3<br />
Keith Ladinsky keys<br />
Stoney Dixon bass<br />
Mandale McGee drums<br />
Portico Quartet:<br />
Jack Wyllie soprano/alto saxophone<br />
Duncan Bellamy hang/percussion<br />
Milo Fitzpatrick double bass<br />
Nick Mulvey hang/percussion<br />
The glorious musical achievements of the<br />
great improvisers from Louis Armstrong and<br />
Sidney Bechet onward have tended to<br />
obscure the fact that jazz has always been,<br />
to some extent, an arranged music –<br />
notably in the work of Jelly Roll Morton and<br />
soon after in the work of Ellington, Don<br />
Redman, Basie et al. Even the bebop<br />
revolution of the 1940s was quickly codified<br />
by a new generation of arrangers such as<br />
Gil Fuller, George Russell, John Lewis and<br />
Gerry Mulligan.<br />
<strong>Maria</strong> <strong>Schneider</strong> © Dani Gurgel<br />
Subsequently the continued research into<br />
the holy grail of combining arranging and<br />
improvisation undertaken by Ellington, Billy<br />
Strayhorn, Gil Evans, Charles Mingus and<br />
others produced some of the high points of<br />
1950s and 1960s jazz – by which time the<br />
use of the recording studio had widened the<br />
scope of arranging, as producers became<br />
sound architects in the broadest sense. This<br />
was the key role that Teo Macero played in<br />
giving shape and focus to the music of Miles<br />
Davis in his Columbia years.<br />
Now, when jazz improvisers seem to have<br />
few new worlds left to conquer, it is<br />
arrangers, composers and producers who<br />
are creating some of the most interesting<br />
new music as jazz enters its second century.<br />
The <strong>Maria</strong> <strong>Schneider</strong> Orchestra is in the<br />
vanguard of this shift.<br />
If poetry is, as Wordsworth put it, emotion<br />
recollected in tranquillity, then perhaps jazz<br />
arranging is something to do with
Orchestra is simply one of the most<br />
interesting gigs on the planet. The<br />
remarkable soloists who have blossomed in<br />
the contexts created by <strong>Schneider</strong> include<br />
Ingrid Jensen (trumpet and flugelhorn), Rich<br />
Perry and Donny McCaslin (tenor<br />
saxophone) and Scott Robinson and Steve<br />
Wilson on various reeds.<br />
One of <strong>Schneider</strong>’s many UK fans is<br />
composer, arranger and trumpeter Guy<br />
Barker. ‘You can’t really label it, it’s pure<br />
music that she creates,’ suggests Barker. ‘The<br />
fact she has a line-up that resembles a big<br />
band is almost incidental - the music that<br />
pours out is incredibly well-constructed and<br />
composed, and doesn’t follow the form of a<br />
normal big band – it’s more symphonic.’<br />
<strong>Maria</strong> <strong>Schneider</strong> © Jimmy & Dena Katz<br />
improvisation recaptured in tranquillity.<br />
Except that in the New York jazz world t<strong>here</strong><br />
is precious little tranquillity to go round, and<br />
holding a large band together and<br />
composing for it can be a Sysiphean struggle.<br />
It’s an achievement normally associated<br />
with larger-than-life figures with more than a<br />
tendency towards authoritarianism.<br />
<strong>Schneider</strong> comes from a more easy-going<br />
tradition of bandleading – from Ellington<br />
via her mentor Gil Evans – and in her live<br />
performances her complete focus on the<br />
musicians is eagle-eyed but sympathetic, as<br />
if she is determined to draw out every ounce<br />
of their own creativity. The subtle, delicate and<br />
integrated sound the orchestra makes under<br />
her direction is one of the most exhilarating<br />
achievements in contemporary music.<br />
It’s a musical and managerial achievement<br />
that has many journalists reaching for clichés<br />
like ‘feminine wiles’ - but is probably more<br />
to do with the fact that the <strong>Maria</strong> <strong>Schneider</strong><br />
‘Her music becomes ingrained in all the<br />
musicians who play it, and they carry the<br />
responsibility of getting her musical message<br />
across. And, without exception, they do it<br />
brilliantly.’<br />
Born in Minnesota in the US Mid-West,<br />
<strong>Schneider</strong> arrived in New York City in 1985<br />
after studying at the University of<br />
Minnesota, the University of Miami and the<br />
Eastman School of Music (w<strong>here</strong> she won<br />
the Down Beat student award for<br />
composition in 1984). She immediately<br />
sought out trombonist and arranger Bob<br />
Brookmeyer to study composition, and at<br />
the same time became an assistant to Gil<br />
Evans, working on various projects with him.<br />
The <strong>Maria</strong> <strong>Schneider</strong> Jazz Orchestra came<br />
into being in 1993, when <strong>Schneider</strong> took the<br />
risk of paying 17 musicians to turn up on a<br />
Monday night at the Greenwich Village club<br />
Visiones. In the fine New York tradition, this<br />
group became one of the resident big<br />
bands to watch and provided <strong>Schneider</strong><br />
with the canvas on which to paint her music.
track Cerulean Skies and was<br />
named ‘Jazz Album of the Year’<br />
from New York’s Village Voice, as<br />
well as many other critics’ awards<br />
around the world. It was also one<br />
of just two albums to receive a<br />
five-star review from Downbeat in<br />
2007.<br />
Portico Quartet<br />
Their residency lasted five years.<br />
Since then, the orchestra has performed at<br />
festivals and concert halls across Europe as<br />
well as in Brazil and Macau. Her commissions<br />
include: El Viento for the Carnegie Hall Jazz<br />
Orchestra; Bulería, Soleá y Rumba for Jazz<br />
at Lincoln Center; Aires de Lando for the Los<br />
Angeles Philharmonic Association and<br />
Cerulean Skies for Peter Sellars’ New<br />
Crowned Hope Festival.<br />
<strong>Schneider</strong> has had a distinguished recording<br />
career as well. Her debut recording<br />
Evanescence was nominated for two 1995<br />
Grammy Awards; her second and third<br />
recordings Coming About and Allégresse<br />
were also nominated for Grammys. With<br />
Concert in the Garden, released only through<br />
her website (through the artist-owned<br />
ArtistShare label), she finally won a Grammy,<br />
the 2005 Award for ‘Best Large Ensemble<br />
Album’ – becoming the first Grammy-winning<br />
recording artists with internet-only sales.<br />
Her newest fan-funded ArtistShare<br />
recording, Sky Blue, released in July 2007,<br />
has also gat<strong>here</strong>d an impressive collection<br />
of awards and nominations. It won a ‘Best<br />
Instrumental Composition’ Grammy for the<br />
Portico Quartet<br />
This fresh-sounding quartet has<br />
married the traditions of Philip<br />
Glass and Steve Reich with<br />
contemporary jazz, and<br />
introduced a new sound – the ‘hang’, a<br />
mellow-sounding hand drum with seven to<br />
nine notes which carries many of the<br />
group’s melodies. The Portico Quartet’s<br />
debut, Knee Deep In The North Sea, was<br />
Time Out’s number one Jazz, Folk & World<br />
album of 2007.<br />
‘Portico's hooks are undeniably attractive -<br />
partly through the band's seductive melodic<br />
instinct, and partly through the warm and<br />
liquid sound of the Hang percussion’ –<br />
The Guardian<br />
© Alex Webb 2008<br />
Produced by the <strong>Barbican</strong> in association<br />
with Serious<br />
<strong>Barbican</strong> Jazz<br />
T<strong>here</strong> will be an interval in tonight’s concert.<br />
Smoking is not permitted anyw<strong>here</strong> on the<br />
<strong>Barbican</strong> premises. No cameras, tape recorders<br />
or any other recording equipment may be taken<br />
into the hall.<br />
100%<br />
This <strong>programme</strong> is printed on<br />
100% recycled materials.<br />
The <strong>Barbican</strong> is provided by the City of<br />
London Corporation as part of its contribution<br />
to the cultural life of London and the nation.
do something different<br />
Sun 27 Jul 7.30pm<br />
Gary Burton Quartet<br />
Revisited<br />
With Pat Metheny, Steve<br />
Swallow and Antonio Sanchez<br />
Mon 20 Oct 7.30pm<br />
Brad Mehldau Trio<br />
Fri 14 Nov 7.30pm<br />
Opening Night – London Jazz<br />
Festival in association with BBC<br />
Radio 3<br />
Jazz Voice Celebrating a<br />
Century of Song<br />
with Guy Barker and the<br />
London Jazz Festival Orchestra<br />
Sat 15 Nov 8pm<br />
Bill Frisell<br />
Book Now<br />
www.barbican.org.uk/<br />
contemporary<br />
(Reduced booking fee online)<br />
0845 120 7557 (bkg fee)<br />
Sun 16 Nov 7.30pm<br />
Richard Bona Band<br />
+ Danilo Perez Trio<br />
Wed 19 Nov 7.30pm<br />
Herbie Hancock<br />
Thu 20 Nov 7.30pm<br />
Courtney Pine<br />
+ Empirical<br />
Sat 22 Nov 7.30pm<br />
Chucho Valdes<br />
A rare UK appearance of the<br />
legendary Grammy Award<br />
winning Cuban pianist.<br />
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