Flux Music Essentials … [Azymuth, Eigsti, Matorin, Walden & Wilson]

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Andrei Matorin, Azymuth, Cassandra Wilson, Jazz, Myron Walden, Taylor Eigsti

Flux Music Essentials

Hello jazz enthusiasts, welcome back for another tasty brew of some of the absolute finest jazz available from the shelves of “Flux Music Essentials.” In the mix this week, I’ve conjured up another diverse palette of music featuring vocalist Cassandra Wilson, Brazil’s finest Azymuth, saxophonists Myron Walden, pianist Taylor Eigsti and violinist Andrei Matorin. Hopefully, during your travels you’ve met these excellent recordings along the way.

Cassandra Wilson - New Moon Daughter

Cassandra Wilson -|- New Moon Daughter – [Blue Note, 1996]

Without a doubt New Moon Daughter is my favorite Cassandra Wilson album. Not to say that the others weren’t also excellent. They definitely were. I still listen to Blue Night til Dawn and Traveling Miles regularly. But New Moon Daughter is something else entirely. It’s not that New Moon is totally different than any other Cassandra Wilson album. It contains no less than five cover songs which are all excellent. Especially the quietly powerful strange fruit. She really adds another dimension to that song. Her version of love is blindness is just as spellbinding as u2 original. I’m so lonesome I could cry is as heartbreaking as any other version that I’ve heard. And her rendition of The Last Train to Clarksville makes you forget that a group called the Monkees ever made such as song. And her version of harvest moon blew me away. But the true strength in New Moon Daughter are the original songs. Of those my favorites are Solomons song and until, both songs are sung with an almost lovers intimacy. It feels as if she singing to you. Overall an excellent album that will please most if not all fans of Cassandra’s Wilson’s music. –-Amazon.com

Myron Walden’s Youthful Inspiration Reborn With Creative Surge And Soul-Drenched ‘Countryfied’

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African American, Jazz, Myron Walden, Saxophone

Myron Walden

NYC sax man Myron Walden departs from the standard jazz idiom with Myron Walden Countryfied (out in June from Demi Sound Records), a funky, down-home project where “lithe, Southern soul-drenched melodies” (JazzTimes) meet a little blues and rock and roll. An early Countryfied performance at NYC venue Pianos showed the sheer energy of the group.

Countryfied, Walden says, is “down-home music. Nod your head, tap your foot, say ‘Amen.’ From the first bar, we’re in the groove.”

Countryfied results from Walden’s reconnection with the inspirations that first made him love music. Growing up in Miami, he listened to Ray Charles, Otis Redding and James Brown on the radio, “from country to whatever,” he says now. He also heard gospel music in church.

More recently, his work with the Brian Blade Fellowship was revelatory. “Here’s a jazz guy,” Walden says of Blade, “who knew country and blues and made me realize the vast possibilities of music. I wanted to be able to express myself and my emotions beyond the boundaries of style.”

Myron Walden | Momentum

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African American, Jazz, Myron Walden, Saxophone

Myron Walden | Momentum – [Demi Sound Recordings, 2009]

Myron Walden - Momentum

Myron Walden was born in Miami, Florida on October 18, 1972, moving with his mother to the Bronx at age 12, and grew up listening to a wide range of rhythm and blues, blues, soul, and gospel music. Shortly after the move, as Myron’s uncle was listening to a recording of Charlie Parker’s ‘One Night in Washington,’ young Myron was profoundly moved by the music and, hearing the uncle exclaim “Tell it Bird!,” he immediately knew that music was his calling and that music would be his voice.

In some ways, his 2009-2010 trio of albums best reflects the way music made him feel at that early age. “When Brian Blade Fellowship was formed I was really inspired. Here was a jazz master who knew country, blues and early rock. Brian helped me realize the vast possibilities in music. My passion is too expansive to be limited to one style. I like to express myself and my emotions beyond the conventions of any one genre.” With new recordings, ‘Momentum‘, ‘In This World‘ and ‘Countryfied‘, Walden has created a body of work full of range and passion.