BROOKLYN JAZZ UNDERGROUND RECORDS To Release FINGER-SONGWRITER The Sophomore Recording From Pianist/Composer JEREMY SISKIND
Available May 15
FINGER-SONGWRITER features: Jeremy Siskind (piano, compositions), Nancy Harms (vocals) and Lucas Pino (woodwinds)
UPCOMING EVENTS:
May 30 @ 8:00 PM - Jeremy Siskind Solo Recital at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall, performing works by Debussy, Michael Jackson, and music from Finger-Songwriter, 881 7th Ave, NYC
Every Tuesday night in June - Jeremy Siskind with special guests at The Kitano, 66 Park Ave @ E. 38th St., 1 800 Kitano NY,
July 12 @ The Cornelia Street Cafe - CD Release Celebration! Jeremy Siskind performs music from Finger-Songwriter with Nancy Harms and Lucas Pino, 29 Cornelia St., 212 989 9319
Finger-Songwriter, the new recording from pianist/composer Jeremy Siskind (available on Brooklyn Jazz Underground Records on May 15), explores the ways we deal with loss. The opening vocal line, “I'd like to learn how to lose," suggests the emotional gamut and variety of human conditions that Siskind explores through words and music - from nostalgia, to denial, to madness, and eventually to resolve, optimism and hope.
Siskind utilizes a small ensemble to interpret this intimate, yet powerful music, featuring vocalist Nancy Harms; “By a complete coincidence, I played on Nancy's first gig in NYC when she moved here from Minnesota. She gave me an album that I listened to in my car and it stayed there for weeks and weeks and became one of my favorites. I wanted her on this project because she has an intense, focused, and captivating way of delivering a lyric. Plus, her voice has a beautiful, dark tone that's perfect for the music", said Siskind; and saxophonist Lucas Pino; “I knew I wanted Lucas on this project the second I heard his sound - a warm, deep, and heartfelt tone reminiscent of Stan Getz. I like to say that he has the sound of Getz and a phrasing similar to that of Joe Lovano. Plus, he was wonderfully willing to work on some doublings that aren't his usual fare."
The concept behind this group derives largely from Siskind's love of Norma Winstone's recordings, specifically, Like Song, Like Weather and Somewhere Called Home (with piano great John Taylor), her work with Azimuth, Songs and Lullabies (with Siskind's mentor, Fred Hersch), and two recent albums - Distances and Stories Yet to Tell (with Europeans Glauco Venier and Klaus Gesing). Siskind was specifically inspired by, “the warmth of the sound, the intimacy of the setting, and the emotional power of a lyric delivered against a subtly morphing acoustic backdrop".
Another powerful inspiration for the project came from the Siskind's love of words and desire to create with them. Armed with a Master's degree from Columbia University in English and Comparative Literature, having written a thesis on the nexus of music and words in song settings, the majority of the lyrics on Finger-Songwriter come from specific literary texts, which were paraphrased, rephrased, reworked, spliced, and Frankensteined into a new lyric. Texts adapted include poems by Jorge Luis Borges, Elizabeth Bishop, Seamus Heaney, Wallace Stevens, and Henry Longfellow as well as prose by Jack Kerouac, Paul Auster, and Steven Millhauser.
The album's genesis also stems from Siskind's love of, and identification with, the singer- songwriter genre and his desire to create something as personal, intimate, and confessional as Joni Mitchell's Blue or Nick Drake's Five Leaves Left. Siskind has great admiration for a wide range of songwriters including Lisa Hannigan (to whom Siskind dedicates the piece “A Single Moment"), Iron & Wine, Fionn Regan, Damien Rice, Adem Ilyich, Ray LaMontagne, Josh Ritter, Will Stratton, Laura Marling, and Leonard Cohen, among others. Siskind explains the title, “The album is called 'Finger Songwriter' because it suggests that performer and composer/confessor are conflated into a single being, permitting emotional openness in ways than don't always happen in jazz. Although, due to my vocal limitations, I can't be the singer and the songwriter, I'm still a composer-performer and I've shaped the whole process of each song's interpretation."
Finger-Songwriter features vocalist Nancy Harms, saxophonist Lucas Pino, and pianist/composer Jeremy Siskind. Available on Brooklyn Jazz Underground Records on May 15, 2012.
More on Jeremy Siskind
Pianist, composer, and educator Jeremy Siskind - originally from Irvine, CA, now living in NYC - is “a remarkable pianist" and “a rising star on the jazz scene," according to legendary pianist Marian McPartland. Siskind earned his Bachelor's Degree from Eastman and his Master's in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia; he also studies piano with Sophia Rosoff and Fred Hersch. Siskind performs in NYC and around the world as a leader and in-demand sideman with the likes of Chris Potter and Marcus Printup. Since the release of Siskind's previous album on BJUR (Simple Songs, 2010) the pianist placed 2nd in the Montreux Jazz Festival Solo Piano Competition, was a runner-up for the American Pianist Association's Cole Porter Fellowship, performed a classical suite at Carnegie Hall, has had his book, Jazz Etude Inspirations, published by Hal Leonard, and has become the musical director for comedy legend Sandra Bernhard! On his new recording, Finger-Songwriter, Siskind shows himself to be the consummate modern day pianist, possessing fluidity and swiftness, melodic, harmonic and rhythmic sophistication, and a ruminative approach and touch.
Available May 15
FINGER-SONGWRITER features: Jeremy Siskind (piano, compositions), Nancy Harms (vocals) and Lucas Pino (woodwinds)
UPCOMING EVENTS:
May 30 @ 8:00 PM - Jeremy Siskind Solo Recital at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall, performing works by Debussy, Michael Jackson, and music from Finger-Songwriter, 881 7th Ave, NYC
Every Tuesday night in June - Jeremy Siskind with special guests at The Kitano, 66 Park Ave @ E. 38th St., 1 800 Kitano NY,
July 12 @ The Cornelia Street Cafe - CD Release Celebration! Jeremy Siskind performs music from Finger-Songwriter with Nancy Harms and Lucas Pino, 29 Cornelia St., 212 989 9319
Finger-Songwriter, the new recording from pianist/composer Jeremy Siskind (available on Brooklyn Jazz Underground Records on May 15), explores the ways we deal with loss. The opening vocal line, “I'd like to learn how to lose," suggests the emotional gamut and variety of human conditions that Siskind explores through words and music - from nostalgia, to denial, to madness, and eventually to resolve, optimism and hope.
Siskind utilizes a small ensemble to interpret this intimate, yet powerful music, featuring vocalist Nancy Harms; “By a complete coincidence, I played on Nancy's first gig in NYC when she moved here from Minnesota. She gave me an album that I listened to in my car and it stayed there for weeks and weeks and became one of my favorites. I wanted her on this project because she has an intense, focused, and captivating way of delivering a lyric. Plus, her voice has a beautiful, dark tone that's perfect for the music", said Siskind; and saxophonist Lucas Pino; “I knew I wanted Lucas on this project the second I heard his sound - a warm, deep, and heartfelt tone reminiscent of Stan Getz. I like to say that he has the sound of Getz and a phrasing similar to that of Joe Lovano. Plus, he was wonderfully willing to work on some doublings that aren't his usual fare."
The concept behind this group derives largely from Siskind's love of Norma Winstone's recordings, specifically, Like Song, Like Weather and Somewhere Called Home (with piano great John Taylor), her work with Azimuth, Songs and Lullabies (with Siskind's mentor, Fred Hersch), and two recent albums - Distances and Stories Yet to Tell (with Europeans Glauco Venier and Klaus Gesing). Siskind was specifically inspired by, “the warmth of the sound, the intimacy of the setting, and the emotional power of a lyric delivered against a subtly morphing acoustic backdrop".
Another powerful inspiration for the project came from the Siskind's love of words and desire to create with them. Armed with a Master's degree from Columbia University in English and Comparative Literature, having written a thesis on the nexus of music and words in song settings, the majority of the lyrics on Finger-Songwriter come from specific literary texts, which were paraphrased, rephrased, reworked, spliced, and Frankensteined into a new lyric. Texts adapted include poems by Jorge Luis Borges, Elizabeth Bishop, Seamus Heaney, Wallace Stevens, and Henry Longfellow as well as prose by Jack Kerouac, Paul Auster, and Steven Millhauser.
The album's genesis also stems from Siskind's love of, and identification with, the singer- songwriter genre and his desire to create something as personal, intimate, and confessional as Joni Mitchell's Blue or Nick Drake's Five Leaves Left. Siskind has great admiration for a wide range of songwriters including Lisa Hannigan (to whom Siskind dedicates the piece “A Single Moment"), Iron & Wine, Fionn Regan, Damien Rice, Adem Ilyich, Ray LaMontagne, Josh Ritter, Will Stratton, Laura Marling, and Leonard Cohen, among others. Siskind explains the title, “The album is called 'Finger Songwriter' because it suggests that performer and composer/confessor are conflated into a single being, permitting emotional openness in ways than don't always happen in jazz. Although, due to my vocal limitations, I can't be the singer and the songwriter, I'm still a composer-performer and I've shaped the whole process of each song's interpretation."
Finger-Songwriter features vocalist Nancy Harms, saxophonist Lucas Pino, and pianist/composer Jeremy Siskind. Available on Brooklyn Jazz Underground Records on May 15, 2012.
More on Jeremy Siskind
Pianist, composer, and educator Jeremy Siskind - originally from Irvine, CA, now living in NYC - is “a remarkable pianist" and “a rising star on the jazz scene," according to legendary pianist Marian McPartland. Siskind earned his Bachelor's Degree from Eastman and his Master's in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia; he also studies piano with Sophia Rosoff and Fred Hersch. Siskind performs in NYC and around the world as a leader and in-demand sideman with the likes of Chris Potter and Marcus Printup. Since the release of Siskind's previous album on BJUR (Simple Songs, 2010) the pianist placed 2nd in the Montreux Jazz Festival Solo Piano Competition, was a runner-up for the American Pianist Association's Cole Porter Fellowship, performed a classical suite at Carnegie Hall, has had his book, Jazz Etude Inspirations, published by Hal Leonard, and has become the musical director for comedy legend Sandra Bernhard! On his new recording, Finger-Songwriter, Siskind shows himself to be the consummate modern day pianist, possessing fluidity and swiftness, melodic, harmonic and rhythmic sophistication, and a ruminative approach and touch.
For more information contact Jason Byrne, Red Cat Publicity.
