The Story
The Great American Song Book has been in focus of alto saxophone legend Lee Konitz for most of his improviser's life.
The Great American Song Book has been in focus of alto saxophone legend Lee Konitz for most of his improviser's life. For years he returns on stage or studios to the great standards constantly exploring the harmonic and rhythmic structures, never repeating himself in his solo work.
At the Vanguard recording session he made it a point to nearly disguise the melody and let the audience guess which standard he actually improvised on - kind of testing the musical qualities of the listeners who had great fun in this game. Some songs were played quite straight ahead, others were more difficult to decipher. It became immediately evident what great material he had picked to improvise upon. This approach did not only work perfectly well for Lee but for his colleagues as well. German pianist Pianist Florian Weber, US bassist Jeff Denson and Israeli drummer Ziv Ravitz felt fully at home with Lee's demanding concept and used the freedom it gave them to fascinating results. He was so impressed by this international trio that he called their association THE NEW LEE KONITZ QUARTET, pointing out that he hadn't had his own regular group for decades. The band now works on and off with Lee Konitz in Europe, the US and Japan.Lee had lived in Cologne, Germany with his family for 20 years before returning to New York. The last time he had played at the Village Vanguard was 1983 and the New York press gave him a great 'Welcome Home, Lee' and a half page article in the New York Times. The audience loved those two days at the packed Vanguard in spring 2009.
Additional Details
Label: Enja Records
Genre: Jazz
Run Time: 50 mins
Region: 0
Release Date: 05/27/14
UPC: 063757960928
Description
The Great American Song Book has been in focus of alto saxophone legend Lee Konitz for most of his improviser's life.
The Great American Song Book has been in focus of alto saxophone legend Lee Konitz for most of his improviser's life. For years he returns on stage or studios to the great standards constantly exploring the harmonic and rhythmic structures, never repeating himself in his solo work.
At the Vanguard recording session he made it a point to nearly disguise the melody and let the audience guess which standard he actually improvised on - kind of testing the musical qualities of the listeners who had great fun in this game. Some songs were played quite straight ahead, others were more difficult to decipher. It became immediately evident what great material he had picked to improvise upon. This approach did not only work perfectly well for Lee but for his colleagues as well. German pianist Pianist Florian Weber, US bassist Jeff Denson and Israeli drummer Ziv Ravitz felt fully at home with Lee's demanding concept and used the freedom it gave them to fascinating results. He was so impressed by this international trio that he called their association THE NEW LEE KONITZ QUARTET, pointing out that he hadn't had his own regular group for decades. The band now works on and off with Lee Konitz in Europe, the US and Japan.Lee had lived in Cologne, Germany with his family for 20 years before returning to New York. The last time he had played at the Village Vanguard was 1983 and the New York press gave him a great 'Welcome Home, Lee' and a half page article in the New York Times. The audience loved those two days at the packed Vanguard in spring 2009.
Additional Details
Label: Enja Records
Genre: Jazz
Run Time: 50 mins
Region: 0
Release Date: 05/27/14
UPC: 063757960928
