FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
BELA FLECK - THE FLECKTONES ANNOUNCE
THE RELEASE OF ROCKET SCIENCE ON MAY 17
FIRST RECORD WITH ORIGINAL LINEUP SINCE 1991
eOne Music is excited to announce the May 17 release of Grammy Award-winning Bela Fleck - The Flecktones’ new album, Rocket Science. For the first time since 1991, pianist/ harmonica player Howard Levy has returned to the fold alongside bassist Victor Wooten, percussionist/Drumitarist Roy “Futureman” Wooten and banjoist bandleader Fleck to create some of the most forward-thinking music of their long, storied career. While all manners of genres come into play – from classical and jazz to bluegrass and African music to electric blues and Eastern European folk dances – the result is an impossible to pigeonhole sound all their own, a meeting of musical minds that remains, as ever, utterly indescribable. Simply put, it is The Flecktones, the music made only when these four individuals come together.
“There were a lot of unfinished aspects to this line-up of the band,” Fleck notes, “in that it stopped right when we were peaking creatively.” For Fleck, Levy’s return enables the Flecktones to follow through on the original concept of a band “where each person was reinventing their instruments, where every one of us was a kind of mutant.”
“There’s a special thing that happens when the four of us get together and play,” notes Levy. “We all have the same attitude of trying to do things that we haven’t done before and coincidentally, no one else has either.”
Fleck first united the Flecktones in 1988, ostensibly for a single performance on PBS’ Lonesome Pine Special. From the start, there was a special kinship between the four musicians, a bond forged in a mutual passion for creativity and artistic advancement. Three breakthrough albums and a whole lot of live dates followed before Levy decided to move on in late 1992.
Bela Fleck - the Flecktones persevered, playing as a trio and with many special guests, before saxophonist Jeff Coffin joined the ensemble. A succession of acclaimed albums and innumerable live performances continued to earn the band a fervent fan following around the world, not to mention five Grammy Awards in a range of categories.
Still, by 2008, the band had grown somewhat restive and embarked on a temporary hiatus. The seeds of change began with what Futureman calls the “paintbrushes of fate” as Coffin was invited to join Dave Matthews Band after the 2008 death of saxophonist LeRoi Moore. Fleck encouraged him to accept, believing the decision would rejuvenate both DMB and the Flecktones themselves.
All agree that Flecktones music was beckoning them home. The band, which had always maintained a warm relationship with the gifted pianist/harmonica player, recruited Levy for a 2009 tour of the US and Europe, an experience he describes as “extremely invigorating and very energizing.”
“It felt just like it did back when we first started playing together,” says Wooten. “Just with a lot less hair.”
For many Flecktones fans, the return of the original line-up allows a chance to see a band that many had never gotten to witness before. Indeed, a certain segment of the band’s base discovered them during the Jeff Coffin era and may not even be familiar with Levy’s membership.
“There are people who don’t remember the very beginning of the Flecktones,” Futureman says. “It’s like people that started watching Star Trek: The Next Generation and never got to meet Captain Kirk. So here we go, the original crew of the Enterprise coming together on a new mission.”
Visionary and vibrant as anything in their already rich canon, Rocket Science feels more like a new beginning than simply the culmination of an early chapter. Where the band goes from here remains undetermined, but all four members agree that the promise of Bela Fleck - the Original Flecktones has yet to be fulfilled.
Bela Fleck - The Flecktones will be touring throughout the year.
###
For more information, please contact:
Ken Weinstein|Big Hassle Media|212-619-1360| This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
BELA FLECK - THE FLECKTONES - BIO
BELA FLECK - THE FLECKTONES
ROCKET SCIENCE
Groundbreaking banjoist/composer/bandleader Bela Fleck has reconvened the original Bela Fleck - The Flecktones', the extraordinary initial line-up of his incredible combo. Rocket Science marks the first recording by the first fab four Flecktones in almost two decades, with pianist/harmonica player Howard Levy back in the fold alongside Fleck, bassist Victor Wooten, and percussionist/ Drumitarist Roy “Futureman” Wooten. Far from being a wistful trip back in time, the album sees the Grammy Award-winning quartet creating some of the most forward thinking music of their long, storied career. While all manners of genres come into play – from classical and jazz to bluegrass and African music to electric blues and Eastern European folk dances – the result is an impossible to pigeonhole sound all their own, a meeting of musical minds that remains, as ever, utterly indescribable. Simply put, it is The Flecktones, the music made only when these four individuals come together.
“All the different things I do come together to make a new ‘hybrid’,” Bela Fleck says. "Everybody else in the group is doing the same things, collaborating with different people, and pursuing a wide variety of ideas, so when we come together and put all of our separate soups into one big stockpot it turns into a very diverse concoction.”
Fleck first united the Flecktones in 1988, ostensibly for a single performance on PBS’ Lonesome Pine Special. From the start, there was a special kinship between the four musicians, a bond forged in a mutual passion for creativity and artistic advancement. Three breakthrough albums and a whole lot of live dates followed before Levy decided to move on in late 1992.
“I wanted to do other things and there was no time to do anything else,” he explains. “We were probably playing 150 shows a year at that time – maybe more - and it was just too much for me. I’ve never, before or since, done any one thing that much!”
Bela Fleck - the Flecktones persevered, playing as a trio and with many special guests, before saxophonist Jeff Coffin joined the ensemble. A succession of acclaimed albums and innumerable live performances continued to earn the band a fervent fan following around the world, not to mention five Grammy Awards in a range of categories.
Still, by 2008, the band had grown somewhat restive and embarked on a temporary hiatus. The seeds of change began with what Futureman calls the “paintbrushes of fate” as Coffin was invited to join Dave Matthews Band after the 2008 death of saxophonist LeRoi Moore. Fleck encouraged him to accept, believing the decision would rejuvenate both DMB and the Flecktones themselves.
“We were ready for something different to happen,” he says. “We’d been in a kind of holding pattern. We had the same line-up for so many years that it was becoming ‘normal’, we were all drifting into outside things for new musical invigoration, and we were taking more and more time off between albums and tours.”
Each member had been quite busy with a variety of successful projects – including: Bela’s duet collaborations with Chick Corea, a trio with Zakir Hussain and Edgar Meyer (sometimes with the Detroit Symphony) and his expansive adventures in African music, documented in the acclaimed 2009 film and CD, Throw Down Your Heart. Victor’s solo band tours, camps, recording sessions, clinics and CD releases (including an incredible collaborative project with Stanley Clarke and Marcus Miller called SMV, which yielded the album Thunder), and Future Man's creation of his amazing Black Mozart project, and continued development of new instruments.
Still, all agree that Flecktones music was beckoning them home. The band, which had always maintained a warm relationship with the gifted pianist/harmonica player, recruited Levy for a 2009 tour of the US and Europe, an experience he describes as “extremely invigorating and very energizing.”
“It felt just like it did back when we first started playing together,” says Wooten. “Just with a lot less hair.”
Upon the tour’s conclusion, the four musicians agreed to further explore the band’s possibilities, sensing what Futureman calls, “an opportunity to revisit the original scene of the crime.”
“There were a lot of unfinished aspects to this line-up of the band,” Fleck notes, “in that it stopped right when we were peaking creatively.”
For Fleck, Levy’s return enables the Flecktones to follow through on the original concept of a band “where each person was reinventing their instruments, where every one of us was a kind of mutant.”
“There’s a special thing that happens when the four of us get together and play,” notes Levy. “We all have the same attitude of trying to do things that we haven’t done before and coincidentally, no one else has either.”
One thing was certain, however. The 'original' Flecktones were resolute that their reunion would not be rooted in nostalgia. The goal from the get-go was to drive the music forward to places where it might’ve progressed had things gone differently.
“I didn’t want to just get together to play the old music,” Fleck says. “That’s not what the Flecktones are about. Everybody’s full of life and ideas and creativity. I was intrigued by what we could do that we had never done before.”
“Everybody’s still advancing on their instruments,” adds Futureman. “Everyone has grown over these 18 years, so it was an opportunity to realize some of what we were trying to do in the beginning.”
In early 2010, Fleck and Levy first began working on new material, teaming up for collaborative writing sessions at Levy’s home in Evanston, Illinois. Fleck was determined to establish a more inclusive environment as far as composition, to give Levy a greater stake in the writing process.
“We hashed out a whole bunch of ideas together,” Levy says. “He would play things that he was working on, and I would go back into my memory banks and say, ‘I have this incomplete fragment that might work well with the band,’ or we would just improvise things together. It was inspiring, I think, for both of us.”
Their compositional collaboration resulted in a remarkable suite comprised of “Joyful Spring” and “Life In Eleven.” The former was originally conceived of by Levy while in his early 20s, while the idea for “Life In Eleven” had its genesis in the Flecktones’ first incarnation. The band had long wanted to explore one of Levy’s passions, the Bulgarian dance rhythm called Gankino or Krivo. “Almost 12,” a piece Victor and Bela wrote after Howard left the band had earned the Flecktones a “Best Instrumental Composition” Grammy in 1998. Still, the goal of writing a Flecktones piece - with Howard - using the unusual 11/16 or 11/8 time signature was, to Fleck’s mind, “unfinished business.”
“When we got together, the 11 idea came back up and Howard came out with something very Bulgarian,” he says. “I said, ‘It’s really great but it’s really fast and jumpy and complex. What if, halfway through, we dropped into a gospel 11/4 feel that was so natural, that you didn’t even notice it was in 11?’ It was an idea I’d had in my mind for some time, a way of playing something in 11 that didn’t confuse new 11 listeners, due to its complexity.”
Songwriting was, of course, not limited to Fleck and Levy. Futureman’s solo composition “The Secret Drawer” serves as preamble to Levy’s evocative “Sweet Pomegranates,” and Wooten brought “Like Water”, which Fleck helped to complete, which stands as a majestic representation of his flowing, pianistic approach to the bass. For his part, Fleck composed a number of new pieces while also delving into his back pages for “Earthling Parade” and “Storm Warning,” a track that had been a highlight of his live sets when touring with Stanley Clarke and Jean-Luc Ponty. Though he had not previously considered either composition for the Flecktones, the new line-up inspired him to give them a second look.
“Those pieces now seemed more intriguing - with the original line-up,” Fleck says. “Not that they hadn’t been cool in other settings, but with Howard in the picture we could go quite deep into the complicated zone while still keeping them earthy and warm.”
In September, the Flecktones met at Fleck’s home studio in Nashville for the first of two rounds of sessions. Where the band had customarily road-tested new material, working out the kinks in live performance, this time they did not have that luxury.
“We were writing some of the more complex pieces as we were laying them down,” Levy says. “But all of us have done so much recording outside of the group, where we’re used to seeing compositions take shape in the studio, that we were all comfortable with the process.”
“We had to be very aware,” Fleck says, “because we were making final decisions almost from the start. But I think it yielded an improvised quality, an intensity, to the record. It was like, ‘Let’s make some good decisions and then commit to them.’”
In many ways, the album’s sound centers on the return of Levy’s piano and chromatically played diatonic harmonica, taking full advantage of the new melodic designs each brought to the Flecktones’ sonic palette. Known as “The Man With Two Brains” for his uncanny ability to play both instruments simultaneously, Levy has built a remarkably diverse resume over the past twenty years, including session work and touring with folks like Bobby McFerrin, Donald Fagen, Rabih Abou Khalil and Kenny Loggins, his membership in Trio Globo and Chevere de Chicago, collaborations with classical violinist Fox Fehling, and founding Balkan Samba Records and the online Howard Levy Harmonica School. The equally restless Fleck hails Levy as “an incendiary player” who by his very nature forces the band out of their comfort zone.
“When we play together, Victor, Futureman, and I all have to step up our game,” Fleck says, “because Howard is going to throw something unexpected at us, which in certain ways, puts us in an uncomfortable zone, but due to that, we have to push through - into our higher selves.”
While prior Flecktones collections have often featured inventive and innovative instrumentation, this time out the band opted to stick to the basics. Fleck plays an assortment of banjos, mostly vintage, though an electric Deering Crossfire can be heard on “Prickly Pear” and a prototype 10-string banjo is featured on “Joyful Spring.” For his part, Wooten largely bypassed his famed assortment of bass effects, noting that the player is what truly matters.
“In my mind, the instrument is there to allow the musician to feel something and to express themselves,” Wooten says. “The music doesn’t come from the instrument, it comes from the musician. Whatever instrument allows you to express yourself the way you want to at that moment is the one you should play.”
That said, Futureman took the occasion to unveil a new prototype Drumitar, his MIDI-based device that allows him to trigger samples using his fingers. A central element of the Flecktones sound, the first version of the notorious instrument was on its last legs after more than two decades. More significantly, new advances in technology allowed for the creation of a Drumitar more in line with the drummer’s vision, featuring better dynamics and the ability to record his own spectrum of drum samples.
“Twenty years later, the fruit is really ripe,” Futureman says. “There are things that I was trying to do back then but the sounds just weren’t good enough. Now it’s actually swinging the way I always wanted it to swing.”
For many Flecktones fans, the return of the original line-up allows a chance to see a band that many had never gotten to witness before. Indeed, a certain segment of the band’s base discovered them during the Jeff Coffin era and may not even be familiar with Levy’s membership.
“There are people who don’t remember the very beginning of the Flecktones,” Futureman says. “It’s like people that started watching Star Trek: The Next Generation and never got to meet Captain Kirk. So here we go, the original crew of the Enterprise coming together on a new mission.”
Visionary and vibrant as anything in their already rich canon, Rocket Science feels more like a new beginning than simply the culmination of an early chapter. Where the band goes from here remains undetermined, but all four members agree that the promise of Bela Fleck - the Original Flecktones has yet to be fulfilled.
“We’re going to have to have this experience together and see how everybody likes it,” Fleck says. “I know that we haven’t even come close to exhausting the possibilities with this record, but we sure went deeper than we ever had before.”
###
For more information, please contact:
Ken Weinstein|Big Hassle Media|212-619-1360| This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
James Torme Press Release
For Immediate Release
March 10, 2011
James Torme Releases Debut Love For Sale On eONE Music on May 31
James Torme examines time-honored pop and classic jazz standards with swinging big-band arrangements and an old-school R-B twist on Love For Sale, out on eOne Music/Torme Jazz on May 31. For his debut, Torme also premieres several original tunes reflecting a broad spectrum of musicality.
The son of legendary entertainer Mel Torme, James was literally born into the musical traditions he celebrates on Love For Sale. While Torme is his own man musically, he sets out to live up to the standards instilled in him by his father. Having performed around the world with his own jazz trio, Torme assembled the producing team of jazz composer/trumpet player John Daversa and veteran musician/arranger/producer David Paich for this release. Love for Sale features a number of James Torme originals alongside covers including the bigband jazz of Alan Jay Lerner’s “Come Back to Me”, the Cole Porter penned title track. He takes on the pop standards “Autumn Leaves” and What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?” Torme also reinvents the Al Green classic “Let’s Stay Together” and Michael Jackson’s “Rock with You”. Torme taps into his family roots reviving one of his father’s biggest hits “Comin’ Home Baby.”
Torme’s musical history has long been intertwined with that of his family. “My dad was a hero to me, and his lifelong love affair with music inspired my own,” he notes. “My musical vocabulary was born out of the music of my dad and his contemporaries mixed with my own childhood loves like Michael Jackson and Earth, Wind and Fire.” He continues, “Growing up in England, things like Jamiroquai and The Brand New Heavies showed that it was possible to keep the jazz textures I grew up with—brass, strings and woodwinds—in my music, yet let it remain totally fresh at the same time.”
GUITAR GREAT BILL FRISELL AND BRAZILIAN SINGER-SONGWRITER VINICIUS CANTUARIA, CRAFT A STRIKING COLLABORATION, LAGRIMAS MEXICANAS
For Immediate Release
GUITAR GREAT BILL FRISELL AND BRAZILIAN SINGER-SONGWRITER VINICIUS CANTUARIA, CRAFT A STRIKING COLLABORATION, LAGRIMAS MEXICANAS
Entertainment One Music to Release Lagrimas Mexicanas on January 25, 2011
Undoubtedly, Bill Frisell and Vinicius Cantuaria’s new album, Lagrimas Mexicanas, epitomizes a union of extraordinary musicians. Frisell’s and Cantuaria’s own music have clearly distinctive origins, but with complimentary styles. Through the blending of emotive rhythms and harmonies, and the melding of classical and experimental sounds, the two artists have found an easy home with one another. Lagrimas Mexicanas is scheduled for release on January 25, 2011 via Entertainment One Music.
As a guitarist, composer, and bandleader, Bill Frisell has established himself as a visionary presence in American music, best known for his innovative and improvisational guitar playing. Brazilian singer-songwriter, guitarist and percussionist, Vinicius Cantuaria flawlessly merges the classic sounds of bossa nova with contemporary music, creating distinctive compositions and arrangements. Having played together in a variety of settings over the past 25 years, including on one another’s albums, Frisell and Cantuaria had been looking for the right opportunity for a full-on collaboration. Lagrimas Mexicanas presented itself as the perfect occasion.
When Cantuaria moved to New York from his homeland of Brazil, he was struck by the amalgamation of sounds emanating from the streets of New York City. In particular, the diversity of Spanish-speaking people affected him. Cubans, Puerto Ricans, Colombians, Venezuelans, Mexicans and countless others formed a rich multi-cultural collage. As these sounds filled Vinicius’ head and heart, he returned to his Brooklyn apartment and started writing Lagrimas Mexicanas, heavily influenced by the melting pot of New York City.
Similar to the bossa nova movement in the ‘50s and ‘60s, on Lagrimas Mexicanas Frisell and Cantuaria collaborated to fuse traditional Latin rhythms with improvisational jazz methods. Bill understood Vinicius’ vision for the album, and their musical spontaneity inspired Bill’s orchestration. While Cantuaria wrote the lyrics in a mix of Portuguese, Spanish and English, both musicians easily fell into the rhythm of writing the arrangements together. Although their styles differ, Frisell and Cantuaria create charged and breathtaking music, as in “Calle 7,” inspired by Vinicius’ stroll down 7th Avenue in Brooklyn’s Park Slope.
At the heart of the album, Frisell and Cantuaria demonstrate their expertise: Frisell experimentally plays with the arrangements and Cantuaria weaves poetic lyrics with moving rhythms. Together these two great guitarists generate a sublime, beautiful, and accessible world of music. From the opening notes of the first track, “Mi Declaracion” to the final song “Forinfas,” Frisell’s intricate guitar playing effortlessly couples with Cantuaria’s dreamy vocals and his stirring declarations of love to form a united vision.
Bill Frisell and Vinicius Cantuaria view Lagrimas Mexicanas as a singular movement, all emanating from one simple, but powerful place: Love. Together, they communicate a passionate sense of optimism, opportunity and hope.
Vinicius Cantuaria/ vocals, percussion and acoustic guitar
Bill Frisell/ electric and acoustic guitars, loops
All songs composed by Vinicius Cantuaria and Bill Frisell.
For more information, to receive a copy of Lagrimas Mexicanas or to set up an interview with Bill Frisell and Vinicius Cantuaria, please contact:
Pamela Lipshitz | Lip Service Media | This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it | 917-859-6852
Originally formed in 1998, the Irish Tenors are the “gold standard” of Irish singing groups. eOne Music is pleased to announce the acquisition of a catalog of their best-known and loved, chart topping audio and video recordings.
THE VERY BEST OF THE IRISH TENORS (CD Only) features the “classic” Tenors line-up: Anthony Kearns, Ronan Tynan, and Finbar Wright. The compilation brings together such classics as “Danny Boy,” “Toora Loora Looral,” “Last Rose of Sumnmer,” and “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling” (featuring original member John McDermott)---all rendered with the kind of passionate, heartfelt, and thrilling interpretations that have enthralled audiences worldwide.
BELFAST (CD/DVD Combo Pak) showcases the group's obvious concert charisma from a performance given in February 2000. It's a generous smorgasbord of medleys, traditional numbers, and songs from popular sources mixing nostalgic sentimentality with selections of bittersweet melancholy. It also marks the first appearance of the popular Finbar Wright as a member of the group.
DUBLIN (CD/DVD Combo Pak) was recorded live at the Royal Dublin Society Main Hall with a light orchestra in 1999. The album gives each of the three vocalists his own chance in the spotlight, including original member John McDermott, who left the trio to go solo shortly after this album was recorded.
"Astoundingly virtuosic on their own instruments, these three masters - of the banjo, the Indian tabla and the upright bass, respectively - make alchemical gold by intertwining repertoires and world traditions." --- Los Angeles Times
The groundbreaking, category-shattering trio Time for Three transcends traditional classification, with elements of classical, country western, gypsy and jazz idioms forming a blend all its own. The members -- Zachary (Zach) De Pue, violin; Nicolas (Nick) Kendall, violin; and Ranaan Meyer, double bass -- carry a passion for improvisation, composing and arranging, all prime elements of the ensemble's playing.
"MORE TO SAY (REAL LIFE STORY: NEXTGEN)" is Terri Lyne Carrington's third CD, and the sequel to her 1989 Grammy-nominated CD "Real Life Story." This collection is all about the groove: expansive, R-B-driven, and jazz-fueled.