TRIBUTE TO WAYNE SHORTER (CD)

Recent winner of the NEA Masters of Jazz Award, Liebman along with the biggest and brightest NY CITY musicians are back together for an incredible one of a kind, ‘earth-shattering’ ‘homage’ to the great, Wayne Shorter… this is a “”Big””-Large Jazz Ensemble Recording baby!… With Lieb’s fantastic playing, Mats extraordinary arrangements, and the band’s realization of the music, this recording is a superb tribute to Wayne Shorter, the composer and jazz artist Made up of the brightest and most creative New York jazz musicians, everyone is not only well-versed and experienced in the traditional big band performance practices, but each and every one of them are gifted soloists and renowned jazz musicians in their own right. Here, they fall into the ‘inside’ of familiar tunes from their “”jazz youth”” – getting new insights into the works through the intriguing arrangements from Holmquist… What is not obvious until you hear the band is that collectively, the level of musicianship is so high that the band easily breaks the boundaries of the traditional big band. In addition to Liebman’s compositions and the writer’s creative arrangements, the unique sound of the DLBB is also due to how easily the group traverses the line between tonality and atonality; executes dramatic stylistic changes in the moment; and most importantly, can create collaborations of improvised music that are so well-aligned with the compositions that it is hard to tell what is or is not improvised.