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Don Byron

For well over a decade, Don Byron has been a singular voice in an astounding range of musical contexts, exploring widely divergent traditions while continually striving for what he calls "a sound above genre." As clarinetist, saxophonist, composer, arranger, and social critic, he redefines every genre of music he plays, be it classical, salsa, hip-hop, funk, rhythm & blues, klezmer, or any jazz style from swing and bop to cutting-edge downtown improvisation. He has been consistently voted best clarinetist by critics and readers alike in leading international music journals since being named "Jazz Artist of the Year" by Down Beat in 1992. Acclaimed as much for his restless creativity as for his unsurpassed virtuosity as a player, Byron has presented a multitude of projects at major music festivals around the world, including recent performances in Vienna, San Francisco, Hong Kong, London, Monterey, New Zealand, and on New York's Broadway.

BEGINNINGS: Born and raised in the Bronx, Byron was exposed to a wide variety of music by his father, who played bass in calypso bands, and his mother, a pianist. His taste was further refined by trips to the symphony and ballet and by many hours spent listening to Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis and Machito recordings. He formalized his music education by studying classical clarinet with Joe Allard while playing and arranging salsa numbers for high school bands on the side. He later studied with George Russell in the Third Stream Department of the New England Conservatory of Music and, while in Boston, also performed with Latin and jazz ensembles.

COLLABORATIONS: His artistic collaborations include performances and recordings with Mario Bauza, the Duke Ellington Orchestra, John Hicks, Tom Cora, Bill Frisell, Vernon Reid, Marc Ribot, Cassandra Wilson, Hamiet Bluiett, Anthony Braxton, Geri Allen, Hal Willner, Marilyn Crispell, Reggie Workman, Craig Harris, David Murray, Leroy Jenkins, Bobby Previte, Gerry Hemingway, DD Jackson, Douglas Ewart, Brandon Ross, Ed Neumeister, Tom Pierson, Steve Coleman, Living Colour, Ralph Peterson, Uri Caine, Mandy Patinkin, Steve Lacy, the Kansas City All-Stars, the Bang On A Can All-Stars, Medeski Martin & Wood, Angelique Kidjo, Carole King, Daniel Barenboim, Salif Keita, the Atlanta Symphony, Klangforum Wien, Joe Henry, Paul Auster, Meshell Ndegeocello, and many others.

PROJECTS: An integral member of New York's cultural community for almost two decades, Byron has taken part in an extraordinarily wide range of projects. From 1996-99, he served as Artistic Director of Jazz at the Brooklyn Academy of Music where he curated a concert series for the Next Wave Festival and premiered his children's show, Bug Music for Juniors (formerly Tunes and 'Toons). From 2000-05, he was Artist-in-Residence at New York's Symphony Space, where he established is Adventurers Orchestra through another concert series titled Contrasting Brilliance, featuring his takes on music as diverse as Henry Mancini, Sly Stone, the pioneering hip-hop label Sugar Hill Records, Igor Stravinsky, Raymond Scott, Herb Alpert and Earth, Wind and Fire.

Other projects include arrangements of Stephen Sondheim's Broadway musicals; There Goes the Neighborhood, a piece commissioned and performed by the Kronos Quartet; and original scores for the silent film Scar of Shame and a 1961 television episode by comedy pioneer Ernie Kovacs. He wrote and performed music for the dance companies of Donald Byrd, Bebe Miller, Mark Dendy, and Ellen Sinopoli, and was featured in Robert Altman's movie Kansas City and the Paul Auster film Lulu on the Bridge. He also composed and recorded the score for Joel Katz's film Strange Fruit, a documentary about the 1930s protest song made famous by Billie Holiday. Composing commissions include "Spin", a duet for violin and piano premiered at the Library of Congress; "Red", a big band suite premiered at the Monterey Jazz Festival in 2002, and a new string quartet piece for Ethel.

RECORDINGS: Don Byron has released a diverse array of recordings. Since his ground-breaking debut album, Tuskegee Experiments (Nonesuch, 1992), he has recorded prolifically: Don Byron Plays the Music of Mickey Katz (Nonesuch, 1993), a tribute to the sly and bitingly humorous works of the neglected 1950's klezmer band leader; Music for Six Musicians (Nonesuch, 1995) which explores a significant side of his musical identity, the Afro-Caribbean heritage of his family and the neighborhood where he grew up; No-Vibe Zone (Knitting Factory Works, 1996), a vibrant live recording featuring his quintet; and Bug Music (Nonesuch,1996), his spirited showcase of the nascent Swing Era music of Raymond Scott, John Kirby and the young Duke Ellington.

His 1998 Blue Note debut, Nu Blaxploitation, is a funk and hip-hop inspired and "genre-bending" musical meditation with his band Existential Dred, with poet Sadiq and rap icon Biz Markie in performances reminiscent of the spoken-word pieces of Gil Scott-Heron, Amiri Baraka and Henry Rollins; Romance With The Unseen (1999), features a quartet consisting of guitarist Bill Frisell, bassist Drew Gress and drummer Jack DeJohnette playing a wide-ranging repertory, from obscure Ellington ("A Mural from Two Perspectives") to popular Beatles ("I'll Follow the Sun") to Byron originals loaded with socio-political commentary ("Bernhard Goetz, James Ramseur and Me", a reference to the notorious 1984 New York City subway shooting).

With 2000's A Fine Line: Arias & Lieder, Byron continued to blur stylistic borders by exploring and expanding the definition of the modern art song from Robert Schumann and Giacomo Puccini to Roy Orbison and Stevie Wonder. His 2001 release, You Are #6, once again finds him in the company of his longest-standing group, Music for Six Musicians, paying tribute to the Latin and Afro-Caribbean rhythms at his musical roots. His latest Blue Note release, Ivey-Divey, inspired by Lester Young's classic trio recording with Nat King Cole and Buddy Rich, features pianist Jason Moran and Jack DeJohnette and is also his recording debut on tenor saxophone. Ivey-Divey received a Grammy nomination for best instrumental solo and was voted Album of the Year 2004 by Jazz Times Magazine.

Byron's newest CD releases are A Ballad for Many, an album of his compositions performed by the Bang On A Can All-Stars (Cantaloupe Music) and Do the Boomerang, his interpretations of the music of saxophonist, singer, and soul/R&B legend Junior Walker (Blue Note, October 2006).

Don Byron is also an experienced and gifted teacher, who has led residencies at the University of California San Diego, the University of Nevada Reno, Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Columbia University. He is currently a Visiting Associate Professor at The State University of New York (Albany) where he teaches theory, saxophone, improvisation, and composition.
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Aruán Ortiz: Pastor's Paradox

Read "Pastor's Paradox" reviewed by Alberto Bazzurro

by Alberto Bazzurro
January 23, 2024

Eccellenti i brani solo strumentali, a tratti un po' verbosi, zavorrati (come accade spesso, del resto) quelli con l'aggiunta di Mtume Gant alla “dizione": si potrebbe sintetizzare così questo album del pianista cubano (ma da oltre vent'anni di stanza negli USA) Aruán Ortiz, ma sarebbe ovviamente eccessivamente semplicistico. Allora diciamo che anche gli episodi con voce aggiunta (tra i quali deve rientrare pure il conclusivo “No Justice, No Peace, Legacy!," dove lo slogan del titolo viene proferito ...

Album Review

Aruán Ortiz: Pastor's Paradox

Read "Pastor's Paradox" reviewed by Karl Ackermann

by Karl Ackermann
October 25, 2023

When clarinetist and saxophonist Don Byron and pianist Aruán Ortiz teamed up for the recording of Random Dances And (A)Tonalities (Intakt Records, 2018) they brought an unprecedented wealth of stylistic experiences to the studio. The result was an unconventional duo sound that blurred the distinctions between their collective comfort zones. Byron and Ortiz return on the gorgeous Pastor's Paradox, sounding joined at the hip and untethered, simultaneously. In this (mostly) quartet setting, Byron and Ortiz are joined by ...

Play This!

Don Byron: Cleo's Mood

by Ludovico Granvassu
March 1, 2023

In addition to being one of its most-forward looking voices, Don Byron has covered the whole gamut of American music--from Mickey Katz to Raymond Scott, from Duke Ellington to Lester Young and Stevie Wonder--and beyond, from Robert Schumann to Giacomo Puccini. He has done so with his signature sound, a deep understanding of those composers' traditions that didn't prevent his experimentation, and a tongue-in-cheek attitude. At the most soulful end of this eclectic range is his 2006 tribute to Junior ...

Live Review

Don Byron e Aruàn Ortiz al Pinocchio di Firenze

by Neri Pollastri
January 11, 2022

Don Byron e Aruàn Ortiz Pinocchio Live Jazz Firenze 27.11.2021 Ripresa la stagione dopo un anno e mezzo di interruzione causata dalla pandemia, il Pinocchio Live Jazz di Firenze ha presentato come evento speciale della sezione autunnale il pianista cubano residente a New York Aruàn Ortiz e il clarinettista Don Byron, che da alcuni anni collaborano in un duo assai singolare per selezioni musicali e originalità delle interpretazioni, con il quale nel 2018 hanno anche ...

Live Review

Don Byron e Aruan Ortiz in concerto al Teatro Jolly di Palermo

by Maurizio Zerbo
April 12, 2019

Don Byron e Aruan Ortiz Nomos Jazz Teatro Jolly Palermo 9.4.2019 Don Byron è forse il jazzista che meglio simboleggia la multiculturalità musicale del terzo millennio. Come ha dimostrato per l'ennesima volta il suo concerto palermitano, la cultura afroamericana è il punto di partenza di un approccio totale ad una musica fitta di intrecci tra l'avanguardia jazzistica, il blues e l'approccio eurocolto. Al suo fianco ha brillato il pianista cubano Aruan Ortiz, ...

Live Review

Bobby Zankel's Warriors with Don Byron at the Painted Bride

by Victor L. Schermer
May 7, 2015

Bobby Zankel's Warriors of the Wonderful Sound Painted Bride Art Center Philadelphia, PA May 5, 2015 This concert by Bobby Zankel and the Warriors with guest artist Don Byron (who replaced saxophonist Oliver Lake due to the latter's family emergency) was also a celebration of jazz as a rich contributor to the arts. One of the features was the presence on stage of the artist Jeff Schlanger doing one of his inspired sketch-paintings whereby ...

Rediscovery

Don Byron: Tuskegee Experiments

by John Kelman
December 22, 2014

For this column I step away from my avoidance of personalization because its roots and intent are, indeed, very, very personal. The germination of this column began as the result of two coinciding events. First, after months of relative inactivity due to a health matter that, while thankfully non-life threatening and treatable, could take several more months to get me back to my usual breakneck speed and has slowed my writing to a crawl, I began to feel ...

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Performance / Tour

Don Byron's 50th Birthday Celebration

Source: Two for the Show Media
October 16, 2008

For almost two decades, Don Byron has been a singular voice in an astounding range of musical contexts, exploring widely divergent traditions while continually striving for what he calls “a sound above genre." As clarinetist, saxophonist, composer, arranger, and social critic, he redefines every genre of music he plays, be it classical, salsa, hip-hop, funk, klezmer, rhythm & blues, or any jazz style from swing and bop to cutting-edge downtown improvisation. Don Byron’s 50th Birthday in November presents a perfect ...
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137

Event

Meet the Composer Presents "New Music for Soloist Champions" at Symphony Space 3/19/08

Source: All About Jazz
February 26, 2008

Meet The Composer presents “New Music for Soloist Champions" March 19, 2008 at 8:00 PM Featuring the world premieres of works by Don Byron for Lisa Moore, piano Jason Eckardt for Taimur Sullivan, baritone sax Michael Lowenstern for Todd Reynolds, violin Huang Ruo for Min Xiao-Fen, pipa Joan La Barbara for Margaret Lancaster, flute Steven Burke for Mary Nessinger, soprano ...
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324

Recording

Harlem Experiment Featuring Olu Dara, Don Byron, Taj Mahal, James Hunter & More

Source: Calabro Music
July 12, 2007

Brooklyn, NY - It started in 2001 with a simple premise from the groundbreaking indie record label Ropeadope: take acclaimed musicians from a shared hometown, but with vastly different musical backgrounds, put them together in a recording studio and have them create spontaneous art inspired by that city's musical lineage. From this humble thought came Philadelphia Experiment and, hot on its heels, the underground classic Detroit Experiment. Now after four years of deliberation, Ropeadope has broken out its lab coats ...
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117

Performance / Tour

For Don Byron, the Music Has to Feel Right

Source: All About Jazz
February 4, 2007

Near the close of a concert a few years back in Seattle, Don Byron asked the intimate crowd what they wanted to hear next. “Whatever you feel like!" came the reply from one audience member. “It's gonna be that no matter what," shot back Byron. That intangible thing called “feel" may be the only element that unifies Byron's otherwise staggeringly disparate body of work. Over the past two decades, he's tackled klezmer, funk, classical and all manner of jazz music ...
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156

Recording

Don Byron with the Bang on a Can Allstars

Source: All About Jazz
June 21, 2006

Cantaloupe Music, the NYC-based art/indie label, announces the release of a promotional mp3 download from their latest release, Bang on a Can/Don Byron: A Ballad for Many.

Bang on a Can--part rock band, part chamber ensemble, has been pushing the boundaries of experiemental classical, world, and jazz music for 15 years. Their latest project--after years of live collaboration--is a full-length disc of clarinetist/composer Don Byron's compositions, the followup to Byron's Grammy-nominated Ivey-Divey. This disc A Ballad for Many showcases the ...
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154

Performance / Tour

All-Star Group Featuring John Abercrombie, Don Byron, Eddie Gomez And Lenny White Perform At Birdland May 24 - 27

Source: All About Jazz
May 22, 2006

Carlini Group is proud to present an All-Star collective featuring JOHN ABERCROMBIE, DON BYRON, EDDIE GOMEZ and LENNY WHITE May 24 - 27 at Birdland in New York City. Showtimes are at 9 pm and 11 pm. For tickets call (212) 581-3080 or click on the link below.

Combining extraordinary lyric gracefulness and a lithe, serpentine sense of rhythm into a fresh perspective on the meaning of freedom and interplay in and out of the jazz tradition has made guitarist ...
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208

Event

Don Byron Conducts "Ebony Concerto" at March 18 "Wall to Wall Stravinsky"

Source: All About Jazz
February 23, 2006

Don Byron will conduct Igor Stravinsky's jazz-inspired “Ebony Concerto" and “Elegy for JFK" at the March 18 “Wall to Wall Stravinsky" at Symphony Space.

Symphony Space, whose landmark marathons have made it a pioneer in in-depth artistic exploration (including a Wall to Wall Ellington), will present Wall to Wall Stravinsky, a twelve-hour celebration of Igor Stravinsky, perhaps the greatest composer of the 20th Century. Hosted by Symphony Space Artistic Director Isaiah Sheffer, the free event, in the Peter Jay Sharp ...
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125

Performance / Tour

Don Byron Music For Six Musicians At Iridium Jazz ClubThursday-Sunday,August 12-15

Source: All About Jazz
July 28, 2004

IRIDIUM JAZZ CLUB 1650 BROADWAY (Corner of 51st) NEW YORK, NY 10023 RESERVATIONS: 212-582-2121, www.iridiumjazzclub.com

Sets At 8:00 & 10:00 PM

Thursday - Sunday, August 12 - 15 DON BYRON MUSIC FOR SIX MUSICIANS

“Calling Don Byron a jazz musician is like calling the Pacific wet -- it just doesn't begin to describe it," wrote Daniel Okrent in Time magazine. “Though he made his bones as a jazz clarinetist, over ...
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Performance / Tour

Don Byron and Dave Douglas at The Village Vanguard

Source: All About Jazz
January 30, 2004

This week at The Village Vanguard, Jan 27-Feb 1, - Don Byron Quartet featuring Jason Moran, Lonnie Plaxico and Billy Hart. Don Byron, clarinetist, composer and arranger, continues to defy categorization with his new album on Blue Note Records, You Are #6 - More Music For Six Musicians, his second album for this band, his fourth for Blue Note Records, and his ninth album as a leader. Byron is the most innovative clarinet virtuoso to emerge on the jazz scene ...
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Performance / Tour

Ben Allison & Don Byron to perform together for the 1st time!

Source: All About Jazz
December 31, 2002

BROOKLYN, NY - Possible Fireworks, BRIC Studio's monthly jazz series, presents award-winning bassist and composer Ben Allison on Tuesday, January 7 at 7:30pm in a no-rehearsal set with a one-time-only band of his choice, including renowned clarinetist Don Byron and other guest performers to be announced. BRIC Studio, BRIC's intimate performance space, is located on the 2nd floor at 57 Rockwell Place (around the corner from the BAM Harvey Theater) in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. (2, 3, 4, 5 train to ...
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