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Carl Clements

Saxophonist/flutist/composer Carl Clements performs and records internationally in a variety of styles, with a particular focus on jazz, Hindustani classical music, and various forms of improvised and pre-composed music. He has traveled frequently to India to advance his studies and to perform jazz, Hindustani classical music, and a fusion of these and other genres, and performs regularly in Europe with various international groups and to present his original music.

Carl's recordings include two albums featuring his original compositions for jazz quartet, A Different Light (2023) and Forth and Back (2004); nine CDs with guitarist Kevin Kastning (including three trio recordings with Sándor Szabó); four CDs with the eclectic jazz group Crosscurrent; and many others. He is also featured on the Global Music Award-winning album Time Travel by the Indica Project. Carl has performed extensively at jazz clubs and festivals throughout the world, and has performed and/or recorded with Kevin Kastning, Sándor Szabó, Luciana Souza, Steven Kirby, Felipe Salles, Luis Perdomo, Earl MacDonald, Dominque Eade, Steve Davis, Steve Johns, Dafnis Prieto, Edsel Gomez, Gary Smulyan, Ralph Alessi, Ravi Coltrane, Jason Robinson, Bob Weiner, Willard Dyson, George Schuller, John Lockwood, James Newton, Luques Curtis, Jean-Yves Jung, Russ Spiegel, Ranjit Barot, Shankar Mahadevan, Ehsaan Noorani, Loy Mendonsa, Louiz Banks, Gino Banks, Ed Byrne, Charlie Haden, Natraj, and many others.

Carl received a Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology from the CUNY Graduate Center, an MFA in Jazz Performance from CalArts, a BM in Jazz Composition and Arranging from Berklee College of Music, and has studied Hindustani classical flute (bansuri) since 1989. He has played saxophone for over forty-eight years, and studied with Jerry Bergonzi, George Garzone, and Joe Viola. He has played North Indian classical music on the bansuri (North Indian bamboo flute) since 1989, and studied with Amiya Dasgupta, David Philipson, Steve Gorn, Devendra Murdeswar, George Ruckert, Peter Row, and has been a student of Nityanand Haldipur since 1999. He is currently Saxophone/Improvisation Instructor and Jazz Combo Coach at Amherst College and is active as a performer and composer in the international jazz and world music scenes.

Carl Clements: A Different Light

Read "A Different Light" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
May 29, 2024

Sunlight beaming into a church through a stained-glass window is a different light--tinted and soft-hued, suggestive of the presence of divinity. Saxophonist Carl Clements' quartet outing, A Different Light, gives the same impression. Looking to the album's stained glass-like cover art, artist Amanda Barrow's visual for the album seems a fine fit for this distinctive, modern jazz quartet. The painting's colors are mostly muted, with two overlapping spheres (Neptune and Uranus? Or gas giants from another solar system?) in eclipse, ...

Album Review

Felipe Salles: Home Is Here

Read "Home Is Here" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi

by Angelo Leonardi
October 26, 2023

Home Is Here conclude la trilogia del compositore e bandleader brasiliano Felipe Salles (residente dal 1995 negli USA dove insegna all'Università del Massachusetts Amherst) dedicata al tema dell'immigrazione. Un'indagine musicale e multimediale iniziata nel 2018 con The Lullaby Project e proseguita due anni dopo con The New Immigrant Experience, di cui abbiamo già parlato in queste pagine. Qui Salles focalizza il tema dell'immigrazione nel jazz ed ha invitato otto protagonisti della scena di New York ad esibirsi col ...

Album Review

Felipe Salles Interconnections Ensemble: Home is Here

Read "Home is Here" reviewed by Troy Dostert

by Troy Dostert
May 11, 2023

For the third recording from his Interconnections Ensemble, tenor saxophonist and composer Felipe Salles chose to put the artists first--literally. That is, he had extensive conversations with each of the guest musicians on the record before composing the pieces on which each would be featured, thus highlighting their own stylistic and personal characteristics. The result is a polychromatic, adventurous album that allows Salles' multidimensionality as a composer to flourish. And with top-shelf guests such as Melissa Aldana, Paquito D'Rivera, and ...

Recording

Saxophonist Carl Clements Presents 'A Different Light' Out May 23, 2024

Source: Jim Eigo, Jazz Promo Services
May 26, 2024

A Different Light treats the listener to an inspiring musical journey with deeply interactive interpretations of the evocatively eclectic compositions, and superb soloistic, melodic, and supportive contributions by all. Carl’s deep roots in jazz, North Indian, and Latin American music, and various influences from around the world merge into a powerfully original musical voice. Combined with the exceptional musicality of all the band members, this is an album not to be missed. About the Band Carl Clements performs in a ...
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One of the most energizing songs you’ll hear this year is the 7:48 opener, “Onset”… don’t be surprised if you find yourself spinning this tune over and over (and OVER) again; it’s definitely in the “instant hit” category!… “In Sight” … gives each of the players the chance to shine ever so brilliantly. Perfect timeing and flawless recording will have you completely absorbed from the opening note to the closing measure… I predict this song will win awards. This is an amazing jazz journey that gets a MOST HIGHLY RECOMMENDED rating from me, with an “EQ” (energy quotient) score of 4.99.

Dick Metcalf, Editor, Contemporary Fusion Reviews

May 1, 2023 https://contemporaryfusionreviews.com/tantalizing-tasty-original-jazz-carl-clements-a-different-light/

Carl Clements – A Different Light, apart from his talents as a musician, is also a very inspired composer. The arrangements on this album prove it; everything here is done with lightness and intelligence. Across the 9 diverse tracks of “A Different Light,” the musician seems to paint us a novel drawn from his travels and encounters, as the way he manages the instruments in his compositions sometimes reminds me of the brilliant Joe Zawinul, especially when the latter performed accompanying other artists on the piano, allowing space for each while imposing his style. Clements does exactly the same thing, not with his instruments, but with his compositions, which are sometimes dauntingly complex yet always very aesthetic.

I would struggle to pigeonhole “A Different Light” into a too defined category, but with each listen, this album has become “Indispensable,” [highest rating] and I hope you will enjoy it as much as I do.

Thierry De Clemensat
USA correspondent – Paris-Move and ABS magazine
Editor in chief Bayou Blue Radio, Bayou Blue News

PARIS-MOVE, May 1st 2024 https://www.paris-move.com/reviews/carl-clements-a-different-light-eng-review/

Carl Clements, the internationally acclaimed jazz saxophonist hailing from Massachusetts, weaves a remarkable tapestry of sound on both Tenor and Soprano saxophones. With a conversational style that's both explorative and emotionally invested, Clements mesmerizes listeners with his pensées and visions, while the guitar provides a beautiful backdrop to his sonic wanderings.

Mediaversal Music (US), July 2023 https://www.mediaversal.com/music/kastning-and-clements-strand-in-strands.html

"Carl Clements is both a jazz master of tenor and soprano saxophones, as well as, alto flutes, again with many compositions."

Scott S Mertens, The Phantom Tollbooth (http://www.tollbooth.org/index.php/home/music-reviews/994-kevin-kastning-carl-clements-nowhere-no-here)

"The 13 entirely improvised pieces on this sublimely beautiful recording by Kastning... and Clements... tap deep wells of subterranean feeling while simultaneously filtering light from the Empyrean."
Barry Cleveland, GuitarPlayer.com

"catch the remarkable tone Clements invokes... sounding like a lost artifact from Oregon's prime, something providentially found on the cutting room floor during that remarkable band's Music from Another Present Era period...Clements is... conversationally inclined, explorative, emotionally invested, at times Garbarekesque... Clements.. wastes no time mesmerizing the listener as the guitar paints backdrops for his pensees and visions."
Mark S. Tucker, AcousticMusic.com

"… some of the finest sax playing I've heard for some time"."

Roger Trenwith, DPRP, 2012 https://www.dprp.net/reviews/2012/037

“a fine composer and player… … maybe due to his assimilation of Indian music performance techniques. Clements can articulate verbally and on his instrument with ease and dexterity."
Marc Medwin, Bagatellen.com

"Clements tells a compelling story with his strong sense of time and linear development."
H. Allen Williams, Jazz Times

“A touch of Hindustani inflected the entire performance….The scorching solos drew applause every single time.”
Arhat Sett, The Times of India

“The mood is pensive and it flows musically through Carl's soprano saxophone solo as it tells the story in a very picturesque way.”
Peter LaBarbara, Jazz Zine

“…brawny yet thematically rich tenor sax soloing”
Glenn Astarita, All About Jazz

“Clements' style harkens back to early jazz by emphasizing the melodic variation of the piece's central theme rather than using it as a starting point to be abandoned. This results in spare yet friendly runs… Clements' saxophone is more aggressive, invoking the bluster and brilliance of Charlie.”
Ron Davies, Spendid Ezine

“Carl… chirps with power, letting all share in his joy”
John Barrett, JazzUSA

"North March" highlights the strong emotion of Carl Clements' singing soprano sax,” “The intriguing ‘Firefly’… Clements ‘flies’ in, as the sax glides over the track with intensity,” “Clements soulful sax gets the steam rolling.”
Denai Burbank, Jazz Review

"a throaty blues workout, with bracing solos by saxophonist Carl Clements..."
Nathaniel Friedman, Jazziz

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