New York Times features Dave Douglas and High Risk on Press Play
The New York Times will be streaming Dave Douglas' upcoming album High Risk all this week in advance of its release on June 23rd. The music represents Douglas' continued exploration of electronic music through an exciting collaboration with Jonathan Maron (Groove Collective), on electric and acoustic bass; Mark Guiliana (Beat Music, Heernt) on electric and acoustic drums; and DJ, producer and beatmaker Shigeto (Ghostly International) on electronics.
Check out Press Play and pre-order the album now on iTunes or BandCamp.
Wall Street Journal on Sound Prints: "Diverse, abstract and yet highly accessible"
4-star DownBeat HotBox review of Joe Lovano & Dave Douglas Sound Prints!
“The marvelous, mercurial quintet…is one of the foremost ensembles in jazz. . .the band specializes in long-form improvisation with recurring motifs and unpredictable twists and turns. Sound Prints also burns hot, swings hard and showcases Lovano’s and Douglas’ unmistakable personalities.”
Dave Douglas announces new album "High Risk"
Musical Polymath DAVE DOUGLAS Continues Past Explorations of Electronic Music With Groundbreaking Collaboration Featuring SHIGETO
HIGH RISK, Out June 23 on Greenleaf Music
With Producer/Beat Maker SHIGETO,
Drummer MARK GUILIANA, And Electric Bassist JONATHAN MARON, HIGH RISK, Expands Upon Douglas' Previous Forays Into Electronic Music,
Notably On Spark of Being, Moonshine & Freak In
The thing we call jazz and the thing we call electronic music are both fundamentally concerned with newness. Each follows its own particular, seemingly mutually exclusive path of discovery and creation, its own process toward realizing something where before there was nothing: on one hand, through the dynamic, unpredictable, in-the-moment spiritual alchemy of improvisation; on the other hand, through a meticulous, creatively probing exploration and inventive interrogation of technology’s constantly evolving potential.
HIGH RISK is all at once a new musical ensemble – a highly collaborative quartet convened by veteran trumpeter, composer and bandleader Dave Douglas; a new record on Douglas’ own Greenleaf Music imprint – a richly evocative opus, rife with intersecting currents of sound and emotion; and a new conceptual endeavor, grappling with the tricky, even treacherous, but fertile intersection of these two similarly motivated but inherently disparate streams.
While it might be tempting to superficially slot the four musicians who compriseHigh Risk into one or the other side of the jazz/electronic divide, none is exactly a neophyte to this sort of cross-pollination. Bassist Jonathan Maron, who contributes both electric bass guitar and synth (keyboard) bass to this recording, was, as a founding member of Groove Collective, a prominent figure in the fusion-oriented acid jazz movement of the 1990s, when he and Douglas first crossed paths. Mark Guiliana (with whom Douglas first collaborated on a jointly-led project with saxophonist Donny McCaslin) may be one of the hottest, most in-demand young drummers in the jazz scene. His firepower behind the kit is on full, explosive display here – but he’s also an inveterate experimentalist who regularly incorporates electronic elements into his work with his bands Beat Music, Heernt and, perhaps most notably, Mehliana, his genre-defying duo project with Brad Mehldau.
And though Michigan-based Zachary Saginaw, who records under his middle name, Shigeto, is a producer and beatmaker who has released three full-lengths for noted American electronica hub Ghostly International (home to Matthew Dear, Gold Panda, Tycho, HTRK, etc.), and contributes here in the amorphous, hard-to-define role of “electronics,” he's also a lifelong lover and student of jazz, which undeniably informs the nuance, fluidity and melodicism of his productions. As Shigeto explains it: “Jazz has always had a place in my life, whether it was my father playing his records for me or just playing tunes with friends. Before I got into production, all I wanted was to be a jazz drummer.”
As for Douglas – whose recorded resumé stretches back to the late 1980s, including more than forty records as a leader of all manner of ensembles, and whose music has frequently reached beyond jazz to draw on classical, folk, Balkan music, Klezmer, avant grade jazz (not least as a member of John Zorn’s influential Masada quartet) and, on numerous occasions, electronic influences – he has a tendency to describe this new project in paradoxical terms. “It’s all composed, and it’s all improvised,” he says. “This is completely different from the processes that go on in my other bands, and at the same time it’s totally the same: a bunch of highly skilled individuals who bring themselves and their personality and their skills to the table, to attack these ideas and materials that I bring into the session.” And, similarly: “I try to surround myself with people who know very well what they’re doing, but at the same time have no idea what they’re doing – and then we try to dig ourselves out of the hole together. Because of the new sonic things going on with High Risk, it was especially thrilling to see everyone's voice getting integrated into the music moment by moment. Jon, Mark and Zach really went a long way towards creating what is on this record.”
The initial seed for the project was planted last May at a Red Bull Music Academy event at Manhattan’s Town Hall; a live “Round Robin” of overlapping solo and duo improvisations from a wide, interdisciplinary array of musicians including, in this case, Nels Cline, Daedelus, Petra Haden, Allen Toussaint, and Wadada Leo Smith. Douglas was slotted to perform alongside Shigeto, who on this occasion opted to upset expectations and flaunt his jazz roots with a live drum set performance. Backstage, the two struck up a conversation. Shigeto surprised Douglas by telling him he was a fan of his work; the next night, Douglas went to check out a Shigeto gig. And from these initial sparks, the idea of High Risk was born.
Ultimately the balance between the contradictory working methods of jazz and electronic music – the instantaneous, collaborative creativity of improvisation and the lengthy, time-consuming and usually solitary process of production – came with an approach that utilized aspects of each; one that, Douglas says, “respected the process of both sides.” The recordings for the album were made on one single, highly-charged, improvisation-filled day in the studio, but that day was preceded by four careful months of preparatory work – with Douglas writing tunes, sending tracks and samples back and forth, talking to engineers, and deciding how it would all work – and followed by another four months of post-production.
Douglas credits recording engineer Geoff Countryman – a longtime collaborator – and mixing engineer Steve Wall as being pivotal and integral to the ultimate realization of the record, highlighting Wall’s post-production work in particular: “I almost wanted to credit him as a musician... in fact, he is a musician, and what he did was incredibly musical. He brought in a lot of tricky stuff, with samples, keyboards, effects, and even moving sounds around. A lot of it is obvious when you listen to the record, but a lot of it is very subtle. I am very grateful for Steve's contribution, and that of Geoff in capturing the spontaneous live session. The technology was an important part in bringing all these sounds together.”
The finished product is indeed a highly musical, and highly mutable work – one that defies easy categorization but strikes an immediate and compelling emotional connection. The record traces a loose arc from the calm, meandering, slightly surreal “Molten Sunset” through increasingly dramatic and disjointed sci-fi-delic funk grooves, reaching an apex of sorts with the majestically moody title tune before touching back down on elegantly lush and contemplative album closer “Cardinals,” a fine feature for Maron’s musing bass work. Despite the volatility of this potent confluence of players, and the considerable dynamism each of them brings to the session, there’s a sense of focus and coherence here that sets High Risk apart from the more chaotic, open-ended energy of Douglas’ earlier forays into electronically-enriched jazz, notably 2003’s Freak In and his records with ensemble Keystone, including 2007’s Moonshine and 2010’s Spark of Being.
Comparing it to the other electronic records he’s made over the years, Douglas notes: “I find that every time I dig into a new electronic music project, the technology has changed so much that I almost have to reinvent the process of doing it. That ends up becoming part of the composition process for me.” Similarly, Shigeto describes the innovation that arose from taking an unaccustomed – you might say, risky – approach: “I was afraid I wasn't going to add anything worthwhile playing with these badass cats! In the end it was great and forced me to work in new ways.”
As Douglas sums up the project: “The biggest element is this meeting of the worlds; an openness and willingness to put everything at risk. I wanted to create a situation where we really were at risk, we were on a high wire, where the exigencies of being in the moment and creating with your wits from one second to the next was what it was about.” High stakes, high reward. High Risk.
High Risk Tour Dates:
APRIL 20 - Impart Art Center - Wroclaw, PL
APRIL 21 - New Morning - Paris, FR
APRIL 23 - Jazz Dock - Prague, CZ
APRIL 24 - Radio Kraków - Kraków, PL
APRIL 25 - Escuela de Música Andrés Isasi de Las Arenas - Gexto, ES
APRIL 26 - Teatro Principal - Santiago de Compostela, ES
APRIL 27 - Teatro Lara - Madrid, ES
APRIL 28 - Schuttershof - Middelburg, NL
APRIL 29 - Stadtgarten - Koln, DE
APRIL 30 - Maison Pour Tous Voltaire - Montpellier, FR
JUNE 25 - Xerox Rochester International Jazz Festival - Rochester, NY
JUNE 26 - TD Ottawa International Jazz Festival - Ottawa, Canada
JUNE 30 - Montreal Jazz Festival - Montreal, Canada
JULY 1 & 2 - Constellation - Chicago, IL
JULY 3 - Iowa City Jazz Festival - Iowa City, Iowa
Out Now! Sound Prints: Live at Monterey Jazz Festival
BloombergBusiness: How a Star Trumpeter Makes Money Even When Jazz Can't
Dave Douglas is one of the most venerated figures in jazz—and he's figured out how to profit from it
Dave Douglas, the jazz trumpeter, composer, bandleader, record label owner, and podcaster, lives off a narrow road in the woods in a village called Croton-on-Hudson, about an hour north of New York City. It’s a good place for a noisy person. Douglas sometimes practices his horn while keeping time with his feet on his drum set. “I’m not a good drummer,” he confesses. “But it’s a great rhythmic exercise.”
Douglas often multitasks. He's one of the most venerated trumpeters in jazz, has won a Guggenheim fellowship for composition, and has fronted numerous bands, including the acoustic Dave Douglas Quintet; Keystone, a group with a DJ that provided music for silent films; and Nomad, a folk-influenced group that made its debut in the Italian Alps at a concert 10,000 feet above sea level. Douglas is currently working on a record, scheduled for release in June, featuring High Risk, his newest band, and Shigeto, an electronic musician from the Detroit area who weaves video game sounds into his work.
But what's equally remarkable about Douglas is what's least discussed: He's a shrewd entrepreneur who has figured out how to market his music to a global audience at a time when the record industry is struggling to survive. Few musical genres were hit harder by the industry's troubles than jazz. In 2003, Americans bought 23 million jazz albums, according to Nielsen SoundScan. In 2013, they purchased only 5 million. Most major labels have significantly reduced their new jazz releases. Universal Music Group’s Verve, the onetime home of Ella Fitzgerald, is pushing smooth R&B singers such as Ruben Studdard of American Idol fame. Even Blue Note—perhaps the most storied jazz label of all—has morphed into more of a sophisticated adult pop imprint, putting out records by Roseanne Cash and Annie Lennox along with those by hard-core jazz instrumentalists such as Wayne Shorter.
Read the rest here.
Pre-order Sound Prints at iTunes!
Blue Note Records will release "Live at Monterey Jazz Festival", the debut from Joe Lovano & Dave Douglas Sound Prints on April 7! You can pre-order the album & get the lead track right away here.
Blue Note Records announces Sound Prints release date!
JOE LOVANO & DAVE DOUGLAS ANNOUNCE APRIL 7 RELEASE DATE FOR THE DEBUT RECORDING FROM THEIR CO-LED QUINTET SOUND PRINTS
LIVE AT MONTEREY JAZZ FESTIVAL FEATURES TWO NEW COMPOSITIONS WRITTEN BY THE BAND’S PRIMARY INSPIRATION WAYNE SHORTER
Saxophonist Joe Lovano and trumpeter Dave Douglas have announced an April 7 release date for Live at Monterey Jazz Festival, the debut recording from their co-led quintet Sound Prints featuring pianist Lawrence Fields, bassist Linda Oh and drummer Joey Baron. The album features the debut of two new compositions written for the band by the band’s primary inspiration: Wayne Shorter. Sound Prints will be performing at Jazz At Lincoln Center in New York City on May 15 & 16 in The Appel Room as part of their Wayne Shorter Festival. Further tour dates will be announced shortly.
For almost twenty years, Lovano and Douglas have been prime moving forces in the jazz scene, their paths crossing often on stage and occasionally on record. Douglas appears on Lovano's 2001 Blue Note album Flights of Fancy: Trio Fascination Edition Two and they overlapped as members of the SFJAZZ Collective for three seasons during which the band performed the repertoire of Thelonious Monk, McCoy Tyner, and their mutual touchstone: saxophonist and composer Wayne Shorter.
Sound Prints takes their inspiration from the music of Shorter – the band's name is a nod to his classic "Footprints" – however the quintet’s focus is on new original compositions by Lovano and Douglas, as well as new Shorter compositions in direct collaboration with the composer himself. The band is fueled by a desire to push the boundaries of their music as far as they can stretch, similar to the expansive role Shorter has played in jazz since his debut with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers in 1959.
In the album’s liner notes Shorter exclaims: "Onward! Dave Douglas, Joe Lovano, Lawrence Fields, Linda Oh and Joey Baron! It’s not often when a combination of musicians such as the aforementioned elect to immerse themselves in an explorative adventure without hesitation or reservation. May they continue forging ahead on the trail less trodden. Onward!”
"The defining trait of Sound Prints," wrote Nate Chinen in The New York Times in a 2012 review of their engagement at the Village Vanguard, "is the tangled crosstalk of its front line: an urbane, on-the-fly counterpoint brimming with crooked urgency, like a choice bit of dialogue in a David Mamet play."
In the summer of 2011 Sound Prints opened for Shorter's Quartet on a European tour. They weren't performing any of his tunes yet but time spent with the legend and his band made a big impact on the group. When Sound Prints appeared on the bill with Shorter at New York's Town Hall in June 2013 he presented them with the new scores of "Destination Unknown" and "To Sail Beyond The Sunset," two pieces commissioned by the Monterey Jazz Festival. "The music came handwritten - very detailed, very precise," says Douglas.
Sound Prints' debut album was recorded live at the Monterey Jazz Festival on September 21, 2013. Lovano and Douglas contributed two songs apiece to the set and the Shorter compositions were given their public debut that day. "The recordings are the very first performances of the newly commissioned tunes," said Douglas. "We all were at a heightened state of paying attention. Shorter took a lot of risks exploring elements of change. It was such a high to play it for him." "The music moves from today into tomorrow," adds Lovano. "Wayne told us the melody was just a suggestion – tell your own story with it."
The 2014 NPR Music Jazz Critics Poll
Dave Douglas & Uri Caine's album Present Joys makes this year's NPR Music Jazz Critics Poll. Read the piece and see the rest of the list here.