"I do think humor is divine. When human beings laugh or smile, they are in a state of grace. I insist on having fun when I play and if the band enjoys itself, the audience does, too. But music contains every feeling and emotion; it's ultimately an expression of love. It's the healing force of the universe, as Albert Ayler said. My music is about inclusion. I always want to bring everyone along on the trip. I want to move people also. I once described the Pocket Brass Band as having one ear cocked to the thump of the second line dancers' feet and the other tuned to the music of the spheres. That describes all my music. I want to have it all." -Ray Anderson
On Friday and Saturday April 29th and 30th
the Ray Anderson Quinteta
featuring
Marty Ehrlich on reeds, James Weidman on piano, Mark Helias on bass, Dion Parson on drums,and Ray Anderson on trombone
will perform at
Sweet Rhythm
in New York.
The mark of a great artist has always been to go beyond technical excellence and impart a personal vision - a sense of style and self-_expression that is indelibly his own. Among modern jazz musicians, no one rises to that standard more than trombonist Ray Anderson, whose sublime mastery of the tricks of his trade is equaled by the bountiful spirit he pours into his one-of-a-kind sound
Described by critic Gary Giddins as "one of the most compellingly original trombonists", he is by turns a supremely lyrical player and bold texturalist, a warmly natural-sounding soloist and footloose innovator.
Named five straight years as best trombonist in the Down Beat Critics Poll and declared "the most exciting slide brass player of his generation" by the Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD.
Anderson has shown remarkable range. He has led or co-led a daunting assortment of tradition-minded and experimental groups, big bands, blues and funk projects and even a trombone quartet. In the tradition of Louis Armstrong, he is a colorful and exuberant performer and a spirited vocalist who induces smiles with his unusual split tones and screech effects. A native of Chicago's Hyde Park, where he was born in 1952, Anderson is the son of theologians. He took up the trombone in fourth grade, influenced by his father's Dixieland recordings. "The sound of the trombone was appealing to me", he says. "All the people I heard play it sounded like they were having fun." (The artists he strongly responded to, he later learned, included 'bone greats Vic Dickenson and Trummy Young.)
He "has a fluency and range on the instrument that would have seemed impossible a few years ago... like a trombone version of John Coltrane's tenor saxophone sound." - Robert Palmer, NY Times
"The most prominent trombonist of his generation." - Gene Seymour, NY Newsday
"Anderson is a true and total original." - Fred Bouchard, Jazz Times
See www.rayanderson.net for more info.
Sweet Rhythm
88 Seventh Avenue South
New York, NY
212-255-3626
www.sweetrhythmny.com
$20. Music Charge + $10.Minimum
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Wednesday, 07 January 2009
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