Johnnie Valentino

Johnnie Valentino: Stingy Brim

by Budd Kopman
May 22, 2006

Omnitone strikes again with Stingy Brim, a release that is billed as commemorating the one hundredth anniversary of the death of the tuba as the bass line instrument, when it was replaced by the string bass. This album is very cool, hip, funny and just unpredictable enough to keep you glued to your chair, unless, that is, you are dancing to the various rhythms that Mark Ferber lays down. The music here is not a re-creation of ...

Johnnie Valentino: Stingy Brim

by Jim Santella
April 4, 2006

The tuba makes a comeback on Johnnie Valentino's modern mainstream jazz adventure, Stingy Brim. His program of original compositions features a creative quintet with nonstandard instrumental voices: guitar, tuba, organ, drums, and clarinet or tenor saxophone. Together, they create a whirlwind of saucy jazz with a contemporary flavor that travels no specific timeline. Slight echoes from the distant past mingle with a little of today and a considerable amount of tomorrow's music, as Valentino's progressive outlook casts a broad shadow.

Johnnie Valentino: Stingy Brim

by Michael P. Gladstone
March 22, 2006

Guitarist/composer Johnnie Valentino beings his South Philly musical background spliced in with a N'awlins turn-of-the-century ambiance on this ambitious guitar-organ-sax album with a few asterisks attached. The inspiration was the 100th anniversary of the end of the use of a tuba, which became phased out by acoustic bass. In order to restore the music to the instrumentation of 1906, Valentino brings the urgency of today's rhythms and compositions into an ensemble that consists of clarinet/tenor sax, guitar/mandolin, tuba and harmonium ...

Johnnie Valentino: Stingy Brim

by Mark F. Turner
March 19, 2006

Appearances can be deceiving. After glancing at the front cover of Stingy Brim and reading some of the information in the package, you may think this is just a typical organ/guitar combo. But what becomes apparent when you listen is that this is some very modern jazz--unique compositions and great sounding music. Johnny Valentino, a Los Angeles-based guitarist, composer and sound designer, commemorates what he states as the “100 anniversary of the tuba's demise as the keeper of the bass ...

Johnnie Valentino: Stingy Brim

by Dan McClenaghan
March 6, 2006

It takes a bit of nerve and some swagger, one would guess, to wear a Stingy Brim hat, one of those straw bowler types with a very limited brim overhang. But guitarist Johnnie Valentine does exactly that.

It also takes a bit a nerve to bring the tuba into a jazz ensemble these days. Back in the early years of jazz, the tuba and the string bass fought it out for control of the music's bottom end, and ...

Johnnie Valentino: 8 Shorts in Search of David Lynch

by AAJ Staff
November 23, 2005

By Ken Waxman

Sort of a modern day Thomas Alva Edison, Los Angeles-based guitarist Johnnie Valentino takes a practical approach to the somewhat esoteric concept of sound design. True to the functional philosophy of the Wizard of Melo Park, Valentino mostly uses manipulated sounds in his day job, scoring and providing sonic textures for animated TV shows and feature films.

8 Shorts is another matter, however. It's a high art application of his collection of found ...

Johnnie Valentino: 8 Shorts in Search of David Lynch

by Rex Butters
April 24, 2005

Guitarist Johnnie Valentino lists “sound designer on his resume, and his Eight Shorts in Search of David Lynch demonstrates the craft. Valentino designs “sound beds, manipulated found sound environments with which the improvisers interact. Each captures a mood, with ambient dream world synergies seeping in, a la Lynch. The worlds spun by these musicians materialize before the mind's eye, each an original sound vignette.

Large throbbing tones, with processed spider guitar running on snare webs, open “Ambiguity. Erik ...