Jazz Police - Ellen Lease/ Pat Moriarty Quintet Features Michael Attias, February 6th at Studio Z

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Tuesday, 09 February 2010

Ellen Lease/ Pat Moriarty Quintet Features Michael Attias, February 6th at Studio Z

Written by Andrea Canter, Contributing Editor

Thursday, 04 February 2010

Michael Attias by Peter Gannushkin

"Michael is a great player and writer with his own style." -- Pat Moriarty

Long known as two of the most creative jazz artists in the area, pianist Ellen Lease and saxophonist Pat Moriarty launched a new series at Studio Z in St. Paul last November, “Tonight at Noon: New Jazz at Studio Z.” The opening concert featured the two musicians in solos and duets. This weekend, on February 6^th, the full Ellen Lease/Pat Moriarty Quintet will welcome guest saxophonist Michael Attias.

Ellen Lease©Andrea Canter

A graduate of University of Minnesota School of Music, Ellen Lease has received both McKnight and Bush Fellowships. Performing across classical and jazz idioms, she has co-led the Ellen Lease/Pat Moriarty Quintet for more than a decade, as well as appearing throughout the Twin Cities with many jazz and new music groups, and had the honor of accompanying Jean Pierre Rampal at his Twin Cities master class.

Pat Moriarty has been on the freer end of the Twin Cities jazz scene for the past three decades, recording in the late 70s with drummer Phil Hey and since with a long list of the edgier musicians and ensembles in the metro area. In addition to composing and performing, Moriarty keeps busy leading the jazz bands at Roseville High School.

The Ellen Lease/Pat Moriarty Quintet has been working together for over ten years, leading critics to describe the ensemble as the “best unrecorded band out there.” Noted Avant Music News, “Through the consistency of personnel and a stable but expanding repertoire, the quintet has developed a high level of group interplay and risk-taking within the structures of the tunes. Although comparisons to the musics of Steve Lacy, Charles Mingus, and the Art Ensemble of Chicago are well taken, this band definitely has its own sound and conception.” The Quintet, which has included Lease, Morarity, Kelly Rossum, Chris Bates and Dave Stanoch, released their acclaimed debut album, Chance, Love and Logic, in March 2008. With Rossum’s departure in August, there will be some changes in the Quintet!

Performing at the second Studio Z concert on February 6th, the ensemble will feature Pat's former student Michael Attias on soprano, alto and baritone saxophones, and will play some of his compositions as well as new and old works from Pat and Ellen. Attias brings a multicultural upbringing to his music. Born in Haifa, Israel, he studied violin while living in Paris, before moving to Minneapolis at age 9. While attending the Childrens Theater Company School, he began studying alto saxophone under the direction of Pat Moriarty. After early graduation and European travels, he enrolled at New York University to study film and music. But university studies didn’t agree with him, and Attias spent the next year traveling in the U.S. and Europe, eventually landing back in Paris working at the IACP (music school) where he met Steve Lacy, Sunny Murray, Bobby Few and more. He began playing professionally, returning to New York in 1993. Today he is involved in many projects as leader and sideman, working with musicians such as Tony Malaby, Nasheet Waits, Tom Rainey, Jacob Sacks, Sean Conly, Taylor Ho Bynum and Paul Motian. In the past decade he has earned several foundation grants and has curated a new music series at Barbès in Brooklyn.

Michael Attias will also appear with the Roseville Area High School Jazz Ensemble on February 8th. Said Pat, “Michael Attias is a really marvelous saxophonist/composer who's been working in NYC since the early 90's.” (Check out his music at www.michaelattias.com)

The final Studio Z concert of the season will be held on May 1st with a quartet featuring Lease, Moriarty, Adam Linz and Phil Hey. “This group may have an actual name, just not yet,” notes Pat. “This concert will be a no-charts evening of free improvisation. We had tried to do this last year but needed to postpone. We're licking our chops!”

“Tonight at Noon” with Michael Attias will be held at 8 pm on Saturday, February 6th at Studio Z, 275 E 4th St., St. Paul (Lowertown); adults $10, students $5 at the door.

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