A Musical Journey
Songs should speak for themselves. Yet, I would like to speak to the journey on which these songs have themselves been.
I picked this material because I’m fond of it. Yet, it never quite found a place in the repertoire of my working ensembles. Some of it has been around as long as I’ve been composing!
A first attempt to revisit it during 2008-10 was imagined as a setting to feature my clarinet playing, and writing for voice. Carl and Alicia are alumni from that project, whose instrumentation was a similar format of woodwind trio, rhythm section and vocalist, including flute, clarinet and bassoon.
That project dissolved organically, but last summer the perfect storm occurred which motivated tonight’s reimagining: meeting Glenda playing English Horn, acquiring a Bass Clarinet, and Laura’s interest in reading this material. After transposing a few existing arrangements for the new instrumentation, we were off on another journey.
I’ve spent the last several months reworking, workshopping, reconfiguring and transforming the material to bring it to a new level of color and detail. Adding Greg, a bandmate of Laura’s from Resonance Jazz Ensemble, brought out a rhythmic dimension that has recently come to the fore.
This recent focus has been to migrate songs from Jazz and Latin Jazz genres and make them more Salsa-like. This includes employing tumbao bass patterns, explicit clave, adjusting the phrasing of melodies to fit the clave, and writing woodwind-based piano-style montunos.
Having found a new stride with this approach, I prepared a few new arrangements for this concert of more recent songs, and a few inspirational covers.
So much for the backstory.
I hope you enjoy our music.
Elaine