New Music Releases: Brian Simpson / Steve Oliver, Joel Ross, Gruppo D'Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza

Brian Simpson / Steve Oliver – Unified

The historic meeting of two Smooth jazz icons! Between them, Brian Simpson & Steve Oliver have scored more than 25 Top Ten Smooth Jazz radio hits, more than 15 Top Ten Billboard Contemporary Jazz albums, toured to packed houses worldwide and shared the stage with everyone from Larry Carlton and George Duke to The Neville Brothers! Brian and Steve are famous for their melodic richness, captivating grooves and delicate touch and Uni?ed is the perfect expression of those qualities. Highlights include the romantic, dreamy "Last Summer," the super-sophisticated "Café du Monde," the grooving title tune "Unifed" plus “The Road Never Ends,” “What The Wind Knows,” “Fired Up,” “Last Summer,” “Like No Other,” “The Way Home,” “Celestial Body,” “A Distant Love,” and “And Then You Loved Me.”

Joel Ross - King Maker

An incredible debut from vibist Joel Ross – an artist who's already given us great moments on records with Makaya McCraven, Marquis Hill, and others – but who's completely his own man here right from the start! Ross instantly emerges as a major creative force – leading the combo, composing the music, and co-producing the set – with a rich vision for the future of vibes in jazz, but one that also carries the depths of previous generations – especially in the way that Joel approaches a tune, with a subtle sense of gravity that makes each new selection a very powerful statement. The group features Immanuel Wilkins on alto, Jeremy Corren on piano, Benjamin Tiberio on bass, and Jeremy Dutton on drums – a tight quintet who work with a great sense of sympathy – and singer Gretchen Parlato also joins the group at one point. Titles include "Prince Lynn's Twin", "The Grand Struggle Against Fear", "Freda's Disposition", "Yana", "With Who Do You Learn Trust", and "Ill Relations". ~ Dusty Groove

Gruppo D'Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza - Gruppo D'Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza (1965)

One of the most obscure chapters in the career of Ennio Morricone – important avant garde work recorded in the mid 60s, just at a point when he was beginning to rise in soundtrack fame! The ensemble is a key Italian modernist group featuring Morricone, Giovanni Piazza, Mario Bertoncini, Egisto Macchi, Gualtiero Branch, Jesus Villa Rojo, and Francesco Evangelisti – mostly classically-trained musicians, but working here in a set of improvisations that are extremely spare, and which are very much at the lower end of the sound spectrum. Many of the sounds on the set are right at the frontiers of hearing – and others, while more present, disappear as quickly as they emerge – further enforcing the mystery and mood of the record. And while the overall style is quite different than Morricone's soundtrack work, the group was clearly a key testing ground for his ideas of sound and space that emerged later. Titles include "Soup", "Scratch", "Settimino", and "Eflot". ~ Dusty Groove