Description
“I think you’ll really enjoy this CD there are absolutely no dull moments, you are going to be taken on the ride of a lifetime, so enjoy it and let me know when you come back to Earth!” – Randy Brecker. Randy Brecker is back in LEAD Large Jazz Ensemble form w/ Mats Holmquist’s incredible writing and arranging – with UMO Jazz Orchestra!
This CD features three compositions and one arrangement written in the late eighties; “One Million Circumstances”, “Summer and Winter”, “Always Young”, “Never Let Me Go” – three arrangements of Chick Corea compositions; “Windows”, “Crystal Silence”, “Humpty Dumpty” -and two new re-compositions based on famous standards; “My Stella” (Stellla by Starlight”) and “All My Things” (“All the Things You Are”). In other words three different periods are represented; late eighties, beginning of the 2000s (Chick Corea) and the present (re-composition of standards). UMO Jazz Orchestra is the only professional orchestra in Finland specialised in jazz and new rhythm-oriented music. The big band of 16 musicians plays about 80 concerts every year in Finland and abroad. The orchestra plays a diverse range of modern music that is on the pulse of the times.
These arrangements all have little (and not so little) twists and turns that keep you on your toes at all times. There are 3 Chick Corea tunes, ‘Crystal Silence’, ‘Humpty Dumpty’ and ‘Windows’ masterfully re-worked by Mats, Two Mats ‘impressions’ or minimalistic versions of so-called “Standards’ ‘Stella By Starlight’ (we both have daughter named Stella by the way), and ‘All the Things you Are’ which are re-imagined with delightful results, the beautiful Ray Evans- Jay Livingston ballad ‘Never Let Me Go’ and then three Mats original compositions: ‘One Million Circumstances’, ‘Always Young’ and ‘Summer and Winter’ each quite challenging in their own way.
Randy Brecker has been shaping the sound of music for decades. His performances have graced hundreds of albums by a wide range of artists from James Taylor, Bruce Springsteen, Chaka Khan, George Benson and Parliament-Funkadelics to two Grammy winners on Summit & MAMA Records.
