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It's My Turn to Color Now

Roberta Brenza

It's My Turn to Color Now

Price: € 19.95
Format: CD
Label: Origin Records
UPC: 0805558285226
Catnr: ORIGIN 82852
Release date: 04 November 2022
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Label
Origin Records
UPC
0805558285226
Catalogue number
ORIGIN 82852
Release date
04 November 2022
Album
Artist(s)
Composer(s)
EN
DE

About the album

Coming to performing later in life, Chicago-based vocalist/songwriter Roberta Brenza makes the most of this debut recording experience as she enlists a brilliant team of playmates — producer and drummer Matt Wilson, pianist Dawn Clement, bassist Cameron Brown, and saxophonist Stacy Dillard, along with special guest, legendary vocalist Sheila Jordan. Together they sculpt an intriguing set of thoughtfully arranged songs such as "Watch What Happens" and "Bye Bye Blackbird," jazz standards like "Take Five" and Don Cherry's "Art Deco," along with two revealing Brenza originals. Having lived in both French and Italian-speaking cultures, she also offers fresh takes on “Les Feuilles Mortes (Autumn Leaves)” and “Estate.” Channeling the long-developing feelings of music she was first exposed to as a child listening to her father's collection, Brenza presents as a full-formed package, revealing new insights from the lyrics as she paints from a vibrant musical palette.
Die aus Chicago stammende Sängerin und Songwriterin Roberta Brenza, die erst in späteren Jahren zu ihren Auftritten kam, holt das Beste aus ihrem Debütalbum heraus, indem sie ein brillantes Team von Mitstreitern um sich schart - den Produzenten und Schlagzeuger Matt Wilson, die Pianistin Dawn Clement, den Bassisten Cameron Brown und die Saxophonistin Stacy Dillard sowie als besonderen Gast die legendäre Sängerin Sheila Jordan. Gemeinsam gestalten sie ein faszinierendes Set aus durchdacht arrangierten Songs wie "Watch What Happens" und "Bye Bye Blackbird", Jazzstandards wie "Take Five" und Don Cherrys "Art Deco" sowie zwei aufschlussreichen Brenza-Originalen. Da sie sowohl in einer französisch- als auch in einer italienischsprachigen Kultur gelebt hat, bietet sie auch frische Interpretationen von "Les Feuilles Mortes (Autumn Leaves)" und "Estate". Brenza kanalisiert die sich seit langem entwickelnden Gefühle für Musik, denen sie schon als Kind beim Hören der Sammlung ihres Vaters ausgesetzt war, und präsentiert sich als vollwertiges Paket, das neue Einsichten aus den Texten offenbart, während sie mit einer lebendigen musikalischen Palette malt.

Artist(s)

Roberta Brenza (vocals)

Roberta Brenza has been a lifelong supporter of the arts, all along a jazz fan who could carry a tune, due in part to her dad's longtime love of Ella Fitzgerald. While raising two sons and doing a variety of nonprofit volunteering—including service on performance arts boards in Boulder, Colorado—she stumbled into an opportunity to pursue a secret, long-held dream to make jazz a focus in her life. Due to her deep passion for the genre, Roberta organized a private youth jazz combo for her then middle-school-aged sons. At the invitation of the boy's teacher, she joined an adult jazz combo class where her naturally adept ear, rich tone, and visceral feel for swing soon led to local gigs and...
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Roberta Brenza has been a lifelong supporter of the arts, all along a jazz fan who could carry a tune, due in part to her dad's longtime love of Ella Fitzgerald. While raising two sons and doing a variety of nonprofit volunteering—including service on performance arts boards in Boulder, Colorado—she stumbled into an opportunity to pursue a secret, long-held dream to make jazz a focus in her life. Due to her deep passion for the genre, Roberta organized a private youth jazz combo for her then middle-school-aged sons. At the invitation of the boy's teacher, she joined an adult jazz combo class where her naturally adept ear, rich tone, and visceral feel for swing soon led to local gigs and many private lessons and workshops. Roberta's first jazz mentor was Boulder-based pianist, Art Lande. Additionally, she sought training and inspiration from a number of consummate women of jazz including Sheila Jordan, Jay Clayton, Ellyn Rucker, Tina Phillips, Marguerite Juenemann, and Dawn Clement. Roberta's zeal and success behind the mic took her places on stage in the jazz world but also offered more opportunities to continue working on behalf of others from the wings. She contributed significantly to the work of New-York-based, Cuban pianist Elio Villafranca, whose Grammy-nominated album, Cinque, Roberta executive-produced in 2017. Elio wrote this intricately composed suite in tribute to Joseph Cinque, the West African man of the Mende people who led a revolt of many Africans on the Spanish slave ship La Amistad in 1839. Cinque features music honoring five Caribbean islands with performances by Elio on piano, along with Wynton Marsalis, Lewis Nash, Steve Turre, and six other instrumentalists of the highest caliber. Roberta was steeped in work honoring the African and Caribbean roots of jazz while learning from behind the glass how some of the greatest instrumentalists of jazz work in the studio. She was also honored with the opportunity to put her own voice on Cinque as part of a small chorus. Roberta then started her own "Marvelous Mrs. Maisel" storyline (the lauded Amazon Prime series), if you will, but this always-supportive mom (and producer) headed to the West Village to sing jazz, not to perform stand-up comedy, and she learned that she had a certain appeal. Spreading her wings in the spotlight of the world capital of jazz was downright exhilarating. That earlier training in Boulder and beyond had given her enough tools to throw herself into a period of sitting in and listening, listening, listening in New York. All this has produced a singer refined organically, in the way it used to go, where you just got out there and tried to learn as much as you could from the masters. During these exuberant plunges into the New York scene, Roberta enjoyed the notable honor to have been accompanied by Roy Hargrove at Smalls and Harold Mabern at Smoke, among many other of New York's great musicians. Getting heard at jams led to invitations for Roberta to contribute her voice to the gigs of some of New York's finest jazz artists, including the legendary Johnny O'Neal, Patience Higgins, Anthony Wonsey, and Jon Davis. Roberta felt encouraged and confident enough to think about recording her first album. She asked a number of esteemed musicians whom she had met along the way, "If you were me, who would you hire to produce your first CD?" To Roberta's enormous delight, the great Matt Wilson said, "I will." And so It's My Turn to Color Now was recorded in June, 2019, with a stellar, largely New York-based band: producer Matt Wilson on drums, musical director Dawn Clement on piano, bassist Cameron Brown, and Stacy Dillard on soprano and tenor sax. With the masterful Mike Marciano of Systems Two at the recording helm, Roberta could not have asked for a more swinging, experienced, and supportive team. Amazing to Roberta, her dear mentor of a number of years, jazz vocalist icon Sheila Jordan, agreed to record a couple of tracks with Roberta, an honor she treasures immensely. It was indeed Sheila who had years earlier been the inspiration that got Roberta back behind the mic after a two-year pause, a crash in confidence. It was seeing Sheila then at 89, still singing, teaching, and uplifting others, that solidified for Roberta that her own path—of having started to sing after many years in the service of others—was invaluable to who she was as an artist. Life experience brings depth to any art form. Then living in Colorado, Roberta was well aware that another highly acclaimed vocalist, also with a history in Colorado, the fabulous Rene Marie, had also started singing in her 40s. Roberta was indeed in good company, and for good reason. Roberta's first album, It's My Turn to Color Now, will be released by Origin Records on August 19, 2022 as a substantial and autobiographically revealing first offering that she hopes will inspire others to pursue their dreams, regardless of age. Indeed, Roberta will be releasing a second album of standards selected in part in reflection on the era of COVID that began in 2020. This album was recorded in the spring of 2021 with the great Johnny O'Neal and his trio, including Mark Lewandowski on bass and Charles Goold on drums. She now lives in her native Chicago after over two decades in the Boulder, Colorado, area where she raised her now-grown sons, Xavier and Gabriel. Roberta enjoys creating visual art as well as singing jazz and has become involved in Chicago's storied avant-garde, creative music scene.

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Sheila Jordan (vocals)

Composer(s)

Michel Legrand

Michel Legrand has made his fame and fortune from writing for films, but he has done significant work in jazz on an occasional basis. In 1957, he arranged a set of Dixieland and swing standards for a French orchestra (recorded on Philips), in 1958 he used three different all-star groups for the classic Legrand Jazz (with such sidemen as Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Phil Woods, Herbie Mann, Bill Evans, Ben Webster, Art Farmer, and others), in 1968 he recorded a strictly jazz set with a trio and Legrand has written for albums led by Stan Getz (1971), Sarah Vaughan (1972), and on several occasions, Phil Woods. Several of his songs (such as 'What Are You Doing the Rest of Your...
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Michel Legrand has made his fame and fortune from writing for films, but he has done significant work in jazz on an occasional basis. In 1957, he arranged a set of Dixieland and swing standards for a French orchestra (recorded on Philips), in 1958 he used three different all-star groups for the classic Legrand Jazz (with such sidemen as Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Phil Woods, Herbie Mann, Bill Evans, Ben Webster, Art Farmer, and others), in 1968 he recorded a strictly jazz set with a trio and Legrand has written for albums led by Stan Getz (1971), Sarah Vaughan (1972), and on several occasions, Phil Woods. Several of his songs (such as "What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life," "Watch What Happens," and "The Summer Knows") have been recorded many times by jazz musicians.

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Horace Silver

Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silver (September 2, 1928 – June 18, 2014) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger, particularly in the hard bop style that he helped pioneer in the 1950s.  After playing tenor saxophone and piano at school in Connecticut, Silver got his break on piano when his trio was recruited by Stan Getz in 1950. Silver soon moved to New York City, where he developed a reputation as a composer and for his bluesy playing. Frequent sideman recordings in the mid-1950s helped further, but it was his work with the Jazz Messengers, co-led by Art Blakey, that brought both his writing and playing most attention. Their Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers album contained Silver's first...
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Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silver (September 2, 1928 – June 18, 2014) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger, particularly in the hard bop style that he helped pioneer in the 1950s. After playing tenor saxophone and piano at school in Connecticut, Silver got his break on piano when his trio was recruited by Stan Getz in 1950. Silver soon moved to New York City, where he developed a reputation as a composer and for his bluesy playing. Frequent sideman recordings in the mid-1950s helped further, but it was his work with the Jazz Messengers, co-led by Art Blakey, that brought both his writing and playing most attention. Their Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers album contained Silver's first hit, "The Preacher". After leaving Blakey in 1956, Silver formed his own quintet, with what became the standard small group line-up of tenor saxophone, trumpet, piano, bass, and drums. Their public performances and frequent recordings for Blue Note Records increased Silver's popularity, even through changes of personnel. His most successful album was Song for My Father, made with two iterations of the quintet in 1963 and 1964. Several changes occurred in the early 1970s: Silver disbanded his group to spend more time with his wife and to concentrate on composing; he included lyrics in his recordings; and his interest in spiritualism developed. The last two of these were often combined, resulting in commercially unsuccessful releases such as The United States of Mind series. Silver left Blue Note after 28 years, founded his own record label, and scaled back his touring in the 1980s, relying in part on royalties from his compositions for income. In 1993, he returned to major record labels, releasing five albums before gradually withdrawing from public view because of health problems. As a player, Silver transitioned from bebop to hard bop by stressing melody rather than complex harmony, and combined clean and often humorous right-hand lines with darker notes and chords in a near-perpetual left-hand rumble. His compositions similarly emphasized catchy melodies, but often also contained dissonant harmonies. Many of his varied repertoire of songs became jazz standards that are still widely played. His considerable legacy encompasses his influence on other pianists and composers, and the development of young jazz talents who appeared in his bands over the course of four decades.

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