Miguel Zenón and Laurent Coq -][- RAYUELA – [Sunnyside, 2012] –

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Arts, Composer, Dan Weiss, Dana Leong, entertainment, Julio Cortázar, Laurent Coq, Miguel Zenón, Pianist, Saxophonist, Sunnyside

Miguel Zenón and Laurent Coq, RAYUELA

Miguel Zenón and Laurent Coq -][- RAYUELA –Mp3– [Sunnyside, 2012] –

The music on this recording was inspired by the book Rayuela, by the Argentine writer Julio Cortázar. This masterpiece has long provided me with an immense amount of inspiration and ideas, forging a possibility for what art could be: a medium of boundless freedom, both for the creator and for the audience. The narrative in Rayuela takes place both in Paris and Buenos Aires, and it was indeed this “”French-Latin American”” connection that ignited the idea for a collaboration between Laurent and myself. We have become close friends through the years but had never had the chance to collaborate on a musical project before (aside from the casual performance here and there). Working on Rayuela seemed like the perfect opportunity.

Ben Wendel -][- FRAME – [Sunnyside Records, 2012] –

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Bassoonist, Ben Wendel, Saxophonist, Sunnyside

Ben Wendel, FRAME

Ben Wendel -][- FRAME –Mp3– [Sunnyside Records, 2012] –

Iconoclastic composer Frank Zappa once wrote, “The most important thing in art is the frame… without this humble appliance, you can’t know where the art stops and the real world begins.”

With his second solo album, Frame, saxophonist, bassoonist and composer Ben Wendel presents a gallery show of nine new pieces that approach that “humble appliance” — the frame — from multi-faceted angles: a snapshot of a pair of French patrons of the arts (“Jean and Renata”); an exotic portrait in rhythm (“Backbou”); the harmonic reframing of a masterpiece (“Con Alma”). But ultimately what the album amounts to is a framing of the self — a self-portrait by an artist who’s come to define his own singular voice.