"An Evening of Indigos,"
2-CD Set by Saxophonist/Composer/Arranger
Bill Kirchner,
To Be Released October 16
By Jazzheads Records
Recorded Live at the New School in October 2014
With Kirchner on Soprano Saxophone,
Pianist Carlton Holmes,
Bassist/Vocalist Jim Ferguson, &
Vocalist Holli Ross
September 8, 2015
Renowned as a renaissance man of jazz -- as an influential bandleader,
sideman (on all of the saxophones, clarinets, and flutes), composer,
arranger, record and radio producer, educator, writer, and editor -- Bill Kirchner is also one of jazz's most deeply soulful soprano saxophone stylists. He plays soprano exclusively on his forthcoming album An Evening of Indigos, a 2-CD package featuring Kirchner in the intimate company of pianist Carlton Holmes, a veteran of the leader's now-inactive nonet; Nashville-based bassist and vocalist Jim Ferguson; and longtime colleague Holli Ross on vocals. Jazzheads Records will release the set, Kirchner's fourth for the New York label, on October 16.
Recorded on October 7, 2014 at a concert in the 200-capacity
performance space at New York's New School for Jazz and Contemporary
Music, where Kirchner has taught for the past 25 years, An Evening of Indigos
presents the quartet in a set of seven Kirchner compositions and six
standards. "The mood at this remarkable concert was indeed indigo but
far from monochromatic," remarks Dan Morgenstern in the package notes.
Kirchner also includes his own comments made at the New School that
night in the program notes:
"Most concerts are, in a sense, variety shows. The standard
idea in programming them is to come up with a multiplicity of tempos and
moods, usually building to a climax. In this case, we're aiming to
explore one mood, though in different facets. And to sustain that mood,
we'll refrain from talking to the audience between songs. . . . Just let
the music and emotions envelop you."
From the album opener "Theme for Gregory," Kirchner's "simple jazz waltz with some nice chord changes," through the closing Rodgers & Hart standard "He Was Too Good to Me,"
the musicians explore many hues of indigo. Several of Kirchner's
collaborations with lyricist Loonis McGlohon are included, among them "Gentle Voice in the Night" and "I Almost Said Goodbye," featuring Ross, and "Foolish Little Girl," with Ferguson on vocals. The vocalists take turns on a medley of Antonio Carlos Jobim's "Someone to Light Up My Life" and "This Happy Madness," both with English lyrics by Kirchner's late friend Gene Lees. Another vocal medley pairs Bacharach-David's "Close to You" (previously recorded as an instrumental on Kirchner's 1999 nonet album Trance Dance) and Buddy Johnson's blues ballad "Save Your Love for Me."
Also performed are Kirchner's (both words and music) "The Inaudible Language of the Heart," sung by Ross; his solo piano feature for Holmes, "Since You Asked"; and his musical setting of a poem by William Butler Yeats, "When You Are Old," sung by Ferguson. The bassist/vocalist and Kirchner duet on Bob Hilliard and David Mann's "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning."
Kirchner's concentration on the soprano, his favorite instrument, is not entirely by choice.
In 1993 he suffered a major setback when he was diagnosed with a
non-malignant but life-threatening tumor in his spinal cord. The tumor
was removed after two major surgeries, but he was left with no feeling
and only two working fingers in his right hand, a pronounced limp, and
chronic pain. Forced to put aside his other reed and woodwind
instruments, he gradually taught himself to play a soprano saxophone
that had been redesigned and rebuilt to accommodate his disability.
"There's an economy to it that's by sheer necessity," he says
of his current soprano style. "It's said that we're all stylistically a
product of our limitations. I'm as good an example of that as anybody I
know.
"It was kind of serendipitous that the only instrument that I
can still play is the one I liked playing the most. I had to relearn
ways of playing it, but not as much as you might think. I guess I just
learned to play with fewer notes. I don't think that my conception of
playing changed all that much. It's just sparer now, that's all."
Born in Youngstown, Ohio, in 1953, Bill Kirchner
started playing clarinet at age 7 and took up saxophone in junior high
and flute in high school. While majoring in English at Manhattan College
in New York in the early '70s, he studied music privately with
saxophonist Lee Konitz and pianist Harold Danko. After college, Kirchner spent five years in Washington, DC, where he played and studied with arranger Mike Crotty and edited transcripts for the Smithsonian Institution's NEA jazz oral-history project.
Kirchner returned to New York City in 1980 and has remained
there ever since. His nonet was active from 1980 to 2001 and recorded
five albums for the Sea Breeze, A-Records, and Jazzheads labels. His
sideman credits include work with the Mel Lewis Jazz Orchestra, Anita
O'Day, Mario Bauzá, and Tito Puente. His arrangements have been recorded
by Konitz, Dizzy Gillespie, Patti Austin, and the Smithsonian Jazz
Repertory Ensemble. He has annotated over 50 projects for Blue Note,
Columbia/Legacy, Mosaic, and other labels and was awarded a Grammy for
"Best Album Notes" for Miles Davis and Gil Evans: The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings in 1996. He edited the books A Miles Davis Reader in 1997 and The Oxford Companion to Jazz in 2000. He produced and wrote four NPR Jazz Profiles and hosted 131 Jazz from the Archives
radio shows for WBGO-FM. And he presently teaches jazz courses at the
New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music, the Manhattan School of
Music, and New Jersey City University.
Photography: Ed Berger
Web Site: jazzsuite.com
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