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Tom Harrell

Praised by Newsweek for his pure melodic genius, Tom Harrell is widely recognized as one of the most creative and uncompromising jazz instrumentalists and composers of our time. Even with a discography of over 260 recordings and a career that spans more than four decades, Harrell has managed to stay fresh and current as he continues to actively record and tour around the world.

He is a frequent winner in Down Beat and Jazz Times magazines' Critics and Readers Polls and a Grammy nominee. Harrell is also a Trumpeter of the Year nominee for the 2012 Jazz Journalists Association Awards. His warm, burnished sound on the trumpet and the flugelhorn, and the unparalleled harmonic and rhythmic sophistication in his playing and writing, have earned Harrell his place as a jazz icon to aspiring musicians and devoted fans alike.

Following the success of his first four albums with the current members of his quintet - a remarkably cohesive unit that includes tenor saxophonist Wayne Escoffery, pianist Danny Grissett, drummer Johnathan Blake, and his bassist of 13 years, Ugonna Okegwo, Harrell’s latest quintet offering, NUMBER FIVE, was released in May 2012. The quintet's previous albums, THE TIME OF THE SUN (2011), ROMAN NIGHTS (2010), PRANA DANCE (2009) and LIGHT ON (2007), received wide critical acclaim and won SESAC awards four years in a row for topping the radio charts in the U.S. In contrast to his signature recordings during the RCA/BMG years (1996 - 2003) where much of his focus was on projects involving large ensembles, the latest albums on Highnote demonstrate Harrell's skills as a leader of a smaller unit that calls to mind the energy and rapport of Art Blakey’s and Horace Silver’s bands.

The sheer joy of playing Harrell's music with one another is evident from each member of the quintet. The writing on these recordings is no less of an achievement than his work for the orchestra or the big band. The trumpeter-composer deftly weaves complex harmonies together with daring rhythmic concepts and unforgettable melodies while utilizing the available colors to full effect. Harrell's music is at once intelligent, soulful, fresh and accessible.

Harrell divides his time between writing projects, live performances, and recordings, and actively tours with his quintet around the world. Recent television broadcasts of concerts include: San Javier Jazz Festival in Spain; Viersen Jazz Festival in Germany; Red Sea Jazz Festival in Israel; Jazz a Liege in Belgium; and Chivas Jazz Festival in Brazil. Harrell was featured as the Artist in Residence at the Barga Jazz Festival (August 2009) and Vicenza Jazz Festival (May 2009). At the latter festival he performed duo, quintet and big band concerts over several days. Harrell also performed music from his WISE CHILDREN and PARADISE albums with the Duisburg Philharmonic Orchestra at Traumzeit Festival (July 2009) and with the Yakima Symphony Orchestra at the Seasons Music Festival (October 2010). In the spring of that year, Harrell reunited with the Jazz Orchestra of the Concertgebouw as guest soloist and arranger for a tour in the Netherlands, after their successful collaboration at the Concertgebouw in July of 2009.

Harrell toured extensively in July and August of 2011 with his quintet, in support of the release of THE TIME OF THE SUN. 2011 also marked the debut of the Tom Harrell Chamber Ensemble. At the Blue Note Jazz Festival in New York, Harrell premiered his latest body of work – arrangements of pieces by Debussy and Ravel as well as his own compositions written specifically for the ensemble consisting of trumpet, flute, soprano and tenor saxophones, violin, cello, piano, guitar, bass, and drums.

The Tom Harrell Chamber Ensemble was featured on PBS’ Soundtracks earlier this year. A graduate of Stanford University with a degree in music composition, Harrell is a prolific composer and arranger. Carlos Santana, Cold Blood, Azteca, Vince Guaraldi, Hank Jones, Kenny Barron, the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, Danish Radio Big Band, WDR Big Band, Brussels Jazz Orchestra, Metropole Orchestra and Arturo O'Farrill & the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra are among the many who have recorded or performed his work.

Harrell's composition and arrangement, "Humility," was recorded for the latter's 2008 release, which just won a Grammy for the Best Latin Jazz Album. Some of Harrell's notable RCA/BMG recordings include WISE CHILDREN, a project in which he combines woodwinds, brass, horns, strings, guitars, percussion and the vocals of Cassandra Wilson, Dianne Reeves, Jane Monheit and Claudia Acuna with his quintet; PARADISE and THE ART OF RHYTHM, both of which feature chamber groups with strings; and his big band project, TIME'S MIRROR.

In addition to the 26 albums and thousands of concerts worldwide as a leader, Harrell has worked with important figures in jazz history including Stan Kenton, Woody Herman, Dizzie Gillespie, Horace Silver, Bill Evans, Gerry Mulligan, Art Farmer, Phil Woods, Lee Konitz, Sam Jones (with whom he briefly co-led a big band in the 70s), Jim Hall, Charlie Haden and with contemporaries such as Joe Lovano and Charles McPherson.

In 2006, Harrell was awarded a Chamber Music America grant with which he composed and performed new pieces for trumpet and piano. He also wrote symphony orchestra arrangements for the French Orchestre National de Lorraine and the vocalist Elisabeth Kontomanou for a live recording album released in 2009, SIREN SONG.

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Tom Harrell, Michael Dease, Eric Jacobson, Caity Gyorgy and more

by Benjamin Boddie
September 11, 2024

Today's Music--Right Now!... Fantastic music by Tom Harrell, Michael Dease, Eric Jacobson, Caity Gyorgy, Shelly Berg, Thom Rotella, Danny Jonokuchi, Bevan Manson, Wayne Escoffery, Jonathan Powell, Emmet Cohen, Hyeseon Hong, Warren Wolf, The Crew, Ben Wolfe, Christopher Parnis, Diego Fugueiredo, Zack Foey, Michael O'Neill, City Of Four and more. Playlist Tom Harrell “Chalcedon" from Alternate Summer (HighNote) 00:00 Michael Dease “Seiko Time" from Grove's Groove (Le Coq) Time 06:15 Eric Jacobson “Pause Time" from Heading Home (Origin Records) ...

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Vince Guaraldi: You're Not Elected, Charlie Brown

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Many a jazz fan was first exposed to the music through pianist Vince Guaraldi's soundtracks for the long series of animated television specials featuring Charles Schulz's evergreen Peanuts characters. That alone would secure Guaraldi's place in the jazz pantheon, but he is also remembered as a composer of the hit song “Cast Your Fate to the Wind" as well as for his forays into Brazilian music, including the popular 1962 album Jazz Impressions of Black Orpheus (Fantasy) and a series ...

Album Review

Vince Guaraldi: A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving

Read "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" reviewed by James Aren

by James Aren
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Just in time for Thanksgiving, the people at Lee Mendelson films are serving up a fresh take on some old favorites. The soundtrack to a A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving has been released for the first time, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the special. Vince Guaraldi's voice is the first sound on the album. “Okay, well, did ya get that last one? This is cue one," as it swings into “Charlie Brown Blues." It is a good introduction ...

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Wayne Escoffery: Like Minds

by Dave Linn
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Wayne Escoffery was born in London and raised in New Haven, Connecticut. He began playing the saxophone at the age of 11, later studying at the Educational Center for the Arts in New Haven and the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. In the late 1990s, Escoffery started gaining recognition on the jazz scene with his tenure in the Eric Reed Septet and later joining the Mingus Big Band. After completing his studies, Escoffery moved to New ...

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Oleg Kireyev and Keith Javors: The Meeting

by Howard Mandel
May 15, 2023

How far must a reeds virtuoso from Bashkiria--a town in the Ural Mountains, southeast of Moscow towards Mongolia--and a pianist-composer-educator from southern Illinois, now living in Philadelphia, have to go to get together? Not very, based on the music Oleg Kireyev and Keith Javors arrive at on The Meeting. Simply to a shared sense of joy in swinging rhythms, warm, rich harmonies and singable songs. In their second co-led album Kireyev and Javors offer more delightful proof that ...

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Tom Harrell: Number Five

by John Kelman
April 24, 2023

"If it ain't broke, don't fix it," they say, and since coming to HighNote in 2007, trumpeter Tom Harrell has lived by that old adage, utilizing the same quintet for its auspicious debut, Light On, and three subsequent recordings, culminating in 2011's outstanding Time of the Sun. Number Five continues Harrell's winning streak with the same line-up, but if each successive recording has reflected the ongoing growth of one of today's most compelling small groups--the chemistry deeper and the interaction ...

Interview

My Conversation with Tom Harrell

by AAJ Staff
June 20, 2021

We rummaged through our extensive pre-database archive and discovered a May 1999 interview with Tom Harrell, who celebrated his 75th birthday this past week. We published two other interviews with Tom: November 2003 and May 2009. AAJ: Do you recall when you were first exposed to jazz? TH: Well, I was fortunate that my parents had a really great library of music, of all kinds of music, including jazz. I was exposed at a really young ...

Birthday