This is my recording of a live performance of Guinga and Harvey Wainapel. (recorded at Casa de Cultura in Berkeley, CA). This is a remarkable pairing of the master brazilian composer/guitarist with the excellent woodwinds artist Harvey Wainapel. Harvey knows Guinga’s music inside/out, speaks fluent Portuguese, and of course speaks fluent “Guinga” enabling breathtaking musical conversations… a meeting of like minds sparking a musical creativity of rare beauty, soul, and spirit. An amazing performance…. Here is the beautiful lively cut entitled Di Menor

Click to hear Guinga and Harvey:

02 Di Menor

Guinga is regarded as a world-class musician and an influential force in the Brazilian music scene.
Since his first album, “Simples e Absurdo”, released through Velas in 1991, Guinga has
had illustrious collaborations with Chico Buarque, Leny Andrade, Aldir Blanc, Leila
Pinheiro, Sergio Mendez and many others. “Suíte Leopoldina” released in the US in
May 2000 was voted the best Brazilian Music CD of the year by music critics.
Guinga creates music that doesn’t age, eternally beautiful and profoundly true.
Guinga is described as the greatest living Brazilian composer of this generation. Critics
and colleagues place Guinga in the exclusive pantheon of Brazilian music gods along
with Villa-Lobos, Tom Jobim and Egberto Gismonti.
“Guinga is like Villa-Lobos meets Cole Porter.” says Sérgio Mendes
“Seeing Guinga perform is one in a hundred years opportunity.” said Gismonti.
“I wanted to exchange my universe for his.” said Paco de Lucia.

Discography: “Simples e Absurdo” (Velas 1991), “Delírio Carioca” (Velas 1993), “Cheio
de Dedos” (Velas 1996), “Suíte Leopoldina” (Velas 1999), “Cine Baronesa” (Velas 2001),
“Noturno Copacabana” (Velas 2003), “Graffiando Vento” (with Gabriele Mirabassi
(EGEA 2004), Casa de Villa (Biscoito Fino 2007)

His compositions are often harmonically and rhythmically complex yet melodically accessible and emotionally resonant.

During the 1970s, Guinga accompanied famous singers such as Beth Carvalho and João Nogueira and recorded with samba legends Cartola and Clara Nunes. He also began a fertile songwriting partnership with the poet and lyricist Paulo Cesar Pinheiro. Their songs were recorded by important artists like Elis Regina, Nelson Gonçalves, Miúcha, Clara Nunes, and Michel Legrand.

His music career took off in earnest in 1990, when Ivan Lins and Vitor Martins formed the Velas label in order to release Guinga’s first album, with a repertoire of songs he co-authored with lyricist Aldir Blanc.

Saxophonist/clarinetist Harvey Wainapel has performed with the likes of McCoy Tyner, Joe Lovano, Joe Henderson, Ray Charles and Johnny Coles. Besides working with these and numerous other leaders,Wainapel has toured extensively under his own name, and has performed in 20 countries. His heavy involvement with the music of Brazil has led to performances with masters of the genre such as Guinga, Dori Caymmi, Airto Moreira, Flora Purim, , Jovino Santos Neto, Nelson Ayres, Laercio de Freitas and Manfredo Fest.

I can’t recommend this album highly enough. Only the highest recommendation possible… This record features the genius songwriting of Joni Mitchell, the intricate collaborations between Hancock and Wayne Shorter, and steller guest performances by Joni Mitchell, Norah Jones, and Corinne Bailey Rae, Luciana Souza, and Tina Turner. Here is a mesmerizing performance of “River” on video.

Also, give a listen to the instrumental cut “A Case of You” featuring the sophisticated interplay between Hancock and Shorter. This album may skirt the definition of jazz for some folks, but it is a deeply felt and highly conceived venture. Thanks Herbie for dreaming this one up… kudos, kudos…..

Reviewer Marshall Bowden adds: ” Joni Mitchell’s music will continue to be of interest to jazz singers and songwriters (see my piece The New Singer-Songwriters) as well as musicians who value music that responds well to a deep reading. River: The Joni Letters is a valentine from the world of jazz to Joni Mitchell, communicating that her heartfelt experimentation with that world has stood the test of time and come full circle to influence the music that influenced her.”

Click to hear “A Case of You”:

11-a-case-of-you

Video of Corrine Baily Rae Singing: “River”

If you want to hear another great track by Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter playing “Round Midnight” in The Miles Davis Quintet just scroll down through the older posts on this blog.  It’s a really good listen…

Click to hear track #1: 01-sugar

OK, this probably looks like an ad for our new CD… It is available on CD Baby, I Tunes, and Amazon. For now, there are a couple cuts from it here on the blog. In a Sentimental Mood is posted a couple posts back. I’ll be getting back to posting the kind of material my blog is known for soon…

Emiko, Stan Poplin, and I recorded this “ridgetop session” at Highland Studios on August 18, 2008. Emiko and I met last July 4th and played for an hour or two at my home… we had a nice connection both musically and personally. She is a dynamic professional pianist, composer, arranger, and performer based in New York. I later wrote Emiko asking if she would like to play for an afternoon at Joe’s studio while on her summer trip to Santa Cruz. . The idea was to explore some musical territory that showed itself during our first visit.. Emiko said “let’s do it” and she asked Stan Poplin to play on the session. Stan is one of the best acoustic bass players on the west coast… having played with Dave Brubeck, Roger Kellaway, Robben Ford, Mose Allison, and myriad of other great musicians. I feel very fortunate to have had Stan and Emiko on this recording. for they are both exceptional in all ways.

I was looking for an all acoustic sound and with Joe’s expertise we accomplished just that. Emiko played the session on Highland’s 7′ Kawai grand piano, Stan played his 19th century standup bass, and I used my favorite guitar, the Andersen Archtop . We were pretty focused and were able to put down these seven songs that day. We chose to play these jazz classics simply because they are beautiful songs that have stood the test of time.

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Click to hear this Song: 02-in-a-sentimental-mood-take-1

This is a track from the CD “trialoque”.

This is one of the greatest ballads ever… written by Duke Ellington.

This is about the greatest sounding mandolin ever.. and played by one of the greatest mandolinists. I met John at Steve Palazzo’s house for a concert and got to hear it from about 5 feet away and even picked a few notes on it… thrilling! Recently I was lucky enough to get a one on one lesson from Matt Flinner and he let me play his Gilchrist mandolin. It is so much like John Reischman’s F-5 in tone, playability, and appearance… they both have a depth and beauty that is hard to describe. ! What a sonic treat to experience these instruments…

©2007 ron clegg

Here is Tony Rice with his Pre War Martin D-28 from the same concert.
ron-clegg

This video gives you a bird’s eye view of Tony’s fantastic technique. Check his fluid picking, clever and economic left hand technique, and, of course the exquisite tone that he is famous for. He is one of the few that can use a Martin flat top style guitar in a jazz format and make it work (Scott Nygaard is another that does it). Of course, this song is not a jazz piece… I’ve presented it mostly for its close camera work of Tony’s facility with the guitar…… I took this series of photos of the Tony Rice Unit in 1985, about the time they had released the album entitled “Still Inside” which I think is one of the all time best “jazz grass” records.

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I love Tony’s his jazz-infused, experimental “spacegrass” with the Tony Rice Unit on the albums “Mar West”, “Still Inside”, and “Backwaters”. These albums with John Rieschman on mandolin, Fred Carpenter on Violin, and Tod Phillips on bass are breakthrough albums which feature Tony and his bandmates playing at a high level that has rarely been matched.

Backwaters has a superb version of “My Favorite Things”… I highly recommend a listen to this exciting and original interpretation of a jazz classic.

More about Tony…… Two highly regarded albums with traditional instrumentalist and songwriter Norman Blake garnered a great deal of acclaim, as well as two Rice Brothers albums that featured him teamed with his late elder brother, Larry and younger brothers, Wyatt and Ronnie. 2007 saw Tony team up with Alison Krauss and Union Station for a string of spring concerts, drawing material from Rice’s 35 year career. Krauss always has cited Rice as being her prime musical influence.

Rice’s most recent recording for Rounder is “Quartet”, the second collaboration with bluegrass and newgrass legend Peter Rowan. Despite recent problems with his voice related to dysphonia, Tony Rice remains one of new acoustic music’s top instrumentalists, bringing originality and vitality to everything he plays.

Photos and Text by Ron Clegg

These photographs were taken at Highland Park in Ben Lomand, Ca around 1985!

click to hear song—05-angel-eyes

This an informal living room recording with me on guitar and Emiko Hayashi on piano. I really like the sparse sound of duet .. and the harmonic movement within the piece keeps me hoppin’. Emiko is based in New York City… she occasionally plays at Birdland and stays busy gigging, writing, and studying. She is a marvelous woman…and a real joy to play music with!

Matt Flinner (mandolin) showed up in Felton, Ca. at Don Quixote’s Music Hall on Thursday night with his excellent stablemates Scott Nygaard (guitar) and Sam Bevan (bass). The place was packed with acoustic jazz, bluegrass, spacegrass, ,psychograss, and just plain …..grass music fans. It’s rare to hear the kind of music that Matt Flinner plays.. Now and again we are graced with talents like Tony Rice, John Reischman, David Grisman, Joe Craven, David Greer, Todd Phillips, and Mark O’Conner here in the Santa Cruz area. Fans of these great players were in abundance Thursday night because they know just how good Matt Flinner really is. Having Scott Nygaard and Sam Bevan as his conversational partners made for the kind of interaction that truly defines jazz.

Right out of the gate we were treated to the sonic excellence Matt is known for. These boys know how to converse, and how to keep their sound and instruments in a perfect balance… and it helps that they are playing some of the finest acoustic instruments ever made. Matt plays a Steve Gilchrist mandolin that is about as close to a Gibson Loar as you will ever hear… maybe better. Scott was playing a fine Collings Dreadnaught guitar with tremendous tone. Scott’s musical vocabulary is extensive, covering everything from jazz, to bluegrass, to traditional, and beyond. The ideas never stop flowing… he is one smart and articulate guitarist and a joy to behold. Blazing fast runs that make sense musically, with an ever present richness of tone that you just can’t get enough of. Sam played outstanding acoustic bass. His highly percussive style really drove the trio and his solos were interesting, lively, and powerful. His scat singing was another fun twist. He is an extremely talented and fun bass player… no wonder he plays with

Joe Craven….!

They covered a lot of ground rolling out a hot rendition of Caravan…. extended solos, trading 4’s, harmony riffing, all in an exciting and stirring style. Another standout was a Bill Monroe tune called “Bluegrass Special”… just reminding us that they can play straight bluegrass as well as anyone alive.. They closed the show out with Matt’s masterpiece called “Paint It Shut”. It’s a fantastic piece of songwriting written to allow a high degree of instrumental conversation and interaction. It’s one of the best songs I’ve ever heard in this genre. The boys deserved and got several standing ovations and they came back for two encores. They delivered the goods, that’s for sure. Just one criticism though, hey Matt, tuck your shirt in would ya? (just kidding). Thanks for a marvelous show…!

Written by Ron Clegg

Photographs by Ron Clegg—– copyright 2008