AVAILABLE NOW via GJKSounds:
Guitarist FREDDIE BRYANT Releases His Most
Personal Recording to Date on
Personal Recording to Date on
Dreamscape: Solo-Duo-Trio
Album Features Performances by
Chris Potter and Scott Colley
"Guitarist Freddie Bryant is a rhythmic and melodic sponge.
Put him in any musical situation, be it classical, jazz, funk, Senegalese, etc.,
and he'll tend to become one with the music." - DownBeat
Imbued with guitarist Freddie Bryant's inimitable touch, inherent soulfulness and the element of surprise, Dreamscape: Solo-Duo-Trio
(available on GJKSounds) is also marked by the guitarist's ability to
seamlessly traverse the classical-jazz divide on this collection of jazz
standards and compelling originals. As a follow-up to his dynamic
recording with his band Kaleidoscope (2012's Live Grooves...Epic Tales), Bryant gets intimate on his latest release, Dreamscape: Solo-Duo-Trio.
Alternating
between nylon string classic guitar, archtop jazz guitar, 12-string
acoustic and electric guitar, Bryant does some skillful genre hopping on
this emotionally charged outing. "This album is a highly personal
portrait of my influences from straight-ahead to Brazilian and classical
guitar but also the key factor of my parents who were consummate
concert artists," notes Bryant.
Joining Bryant for duo and trio numbers on Dreamscape are two acclaimed musicians and bandleaders in their own right -- multi-reedist Chris Potter (performing on tenor and soprano saxophones as well as bass clarinet) and bassist Scott Colley.
"I played with them back in the late '80s-early '90s," Bryant recalls,
"and their playing was always exceptional. They can play anything, and
they play it beautifully and interactively too."
Easily Bryant's most personal and revealing project to date, he performs several solo guitar pieces on Dreamscape,
ranging from Thelonious Monk's lyrical "Ask Me Now" to a rich chord
melody treatment of Charles Mingus' "Goodbye Porkpie Hat." Bryant also
includes a beautiful interpretation of Bruno Martino's melancholy ballad
"Estate" along with a buoyant, bossa nova/samba take on "Secret Love." "I
wanted to do a project that didn't have drums in it, principally
because there's something that happens to the clarity of sound of the
guitar when you have cymbals ringing and drums beating," says the
guitarist. "Of course, I love drums, but there's an intimacy that you
get when you have a microphone right in front of a guitar and nothing
else. When I was a kid I used to sit under the piano and just listen to
my father play. That's the setting I wanted to convey."
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Scott Colley, Freddie Bryant, and Chris Potter
Photo Credit: Fernando Azevedo
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Bryant
grew up in a musical household with his parents, who were both renowned
performers on New York's classical and opera scene. In fact, he began
turning pages for his concert pianist father at the age of six. Bryant
has already dedicated an album to his father, who passed away when he
was in college, but now decided it was time to honor his mother for such
an important role in his musical development.
To that end, Bryant composed the piece "Songs," which is based on tunes he remembers hearing his mother sing. He closes out Dreamscape
with a snippet of a 1974 recording from New York's Alice Tully Hall
that has his mother, Beatrice Rippy, singing the uplifting spiritual,
"I'm Going to Tell God All of My Troubles," accompanied by her husband,
Carroll Hollister, on piano. Bryant also performs a new arrangement of
that same powerful tune on classical guitar as a duo with Potter on bass
clarinet. On the three other trio tracks on Dreamscape,
Potter plays soprano sax on the bristling title track, switching to
bass clarinet on the suite-like "Songs," which travels from work song
form to hymn to gospel vibe, and rounding off on tenor saxophone for the
aptly titled "Everyday is the End and the Beginning of Life Beautiful"
which Bryant wrote on December 12, 2012, the date which marks the
supposed end of the world from interpretations of the Mayan calendar.
Bassist
Colley, a longtime duo partner with the late, great jazz guitar legend
Jim Hall, makes an indelible connection with Bryant on two companion duo
pieces -- the gentle, chamber-like "Vignette #1," which has Bryant on
nylon string classical guitar, and the lively and contrapuntal "Vignette
#2," which features Bryant on electric guitar. "Scott has a beautiful
tone and great ears," says Bryant of the in-demand bassist. "I always
thought of him as such a fluid player, and he's a very melodic
improviser too. It was a joy to play with him."
Dreamscape: Solo-Duo-Trio
will confound those looking to put guitarist Bryant in a stylistic box
as it reaches out to those who simply enjoy good music. "I grew up with
straight ahead jazz and I love swinging with great jazz musicians like
Ben Riley and Tom Harrell," he says. "I love that and it's totally me. I
still play straight ahead but I also play Brazilian music and classical
music. And now this recording makes it a little bit harder to
categorize me. For me, that's a positive thing. And that's why I'm
rejoicing in being able to play all these different styles of music on
these different instruments and have them recorded in such a beautiful
way in this intimate setting."
Freddie Bryant ·
Dreamscape: Solo-Duo-Trio
GJKSounds · Release Date: April 1, 2014
For more information on Freddie Bryant, please visit: FreddieBryant.com
For media information, please contact:
DL Media · 610-667-0501
Matthew Jurasek· matthew@dlmediamusic.com
Serving the Finest in Jazz Since 1988
Information and press materials (including album covers, promotional photos
and bios) on all DL Media artists can be found at our website: dlmediamusic.com
