UNÁNIME Roxana Amed

• 1 Flamenco Sketches 06:03
• 2 Nueva Luna, Mundo Arjo 06:36
• 3 Agua y Vino 02:22
• 4 Dos Tribus 07:41
• 5 A Veces No, Siempre 07:38
• 6 En Mi Soledad 05:45
• 7 Los Tres Golpes 04:09
• 8 Nostalgia Andina 05:18
• 9 Dúo Concertante - Primer Movimiento 05:02
• 10 Adiós a Cuba 06:56
• Total Runtime 57:30

Info for UNÁNIME

Roxana Amed, Argentinian singer and composer based in the United States, presents Unánime. Her new musical journey features notable artists from Latin America and Spain, such as Chucho Valdés (Cuba), Pedro Aznar (Argentina), Niño Josele (Spain), Chico Pinheiro (Brazil), Julio Reyes Copello (Colombia), Tony Succar (Peru) and Linda Briceño (Venezuela). The repertoire includes works by diverse authors, from Miles Davis to Luis Alberto Spinetta, including Egberto Gismonti and Amed herself.

When Ontology, her critically hailed 2021 debut U.S. recording, scored two Latin Grammy nominations in the Best Latin Jazz Album and Best Arrangement categories, Roxana Amed adroitly shifted her artistic focus for her next project. “I was interviewed more by the international media outside of Argentina than I ever had been in my career before,” she recalls, admitting to being a bit surprised. “They all wanted to know about my connection to Latin jazz.”

From the perspective of a native of Argentina, the perception of “Latin jazz” is traditionally associated with music styles of the Caribbean Basin countries. Roxana was eager to translate those idioms but on her own terms, and thus came the working premise for her follow-up recording, Unánime (which translates to unanimous).

“I realized that ‘Latin’ is a very open concept,” Roxana says today. “It may be traditionally associated with the Caribbean area, but in South America, we have other influences and different ways to approach a fusion with jazz. For instance, even when we sing in Spanish, the phrasing, the color, and the mood of our music is very different. So, I came to the realization that I needed to do an album of collaborations with Latin artists, but to experiment and not to be bound by traditional styles.”

The results are as fresh and evocative as one would expect from an artist as daringly individualistic as Roxana Amed. Born in Buenos Aires, the composer, multi-instrumentalist, vocal coach, and vocalist was raised in a family of Italian and Middle Eastern roots. Before relocating to Miami in 2013, she pursued postgraduate degrees in Spanish literature and film and recorded with notable Argentine jazz and pop artists. Since arriving in the U.S., Roxana has maintained a hectic academic and performance schedule, working with such renowned members of the expat community of Argentine musicians in the U.S. as pianists Guillermo Klein and Leo Genovese as well as teaching at the University of Miami’s renowned Frost School of Music.

As on Ontology, Roxana’s vocal forays on Unánime are buoyed by the presence of her longtime collaborator, Cuban American pianist and arranger, Martin Bejerano and his bassist, Edward Pérez, and drummer, Ludwig Afonso. “Martin’s music language is very different from mine,” Roxana admits, “but I love his classical touch. He can play classical music, he can swing, and can play in a Latin groove. The best yet is that his melodies are really challenging. I like to be out of my comfort zone. I’m not trying to be crazy or a revolutionary, but I like to find myself in a new place every time, and Martin makes that desire possible.”

“Beyond the common translation of ‘unanimous,’ to me, Unánime means one soul, one voice, one heart,” Roxana explains. “All the different guests on this album, although coming from different countries, are still united in the love for North American Jazz. And there is also this ‘Latin sound’ blending with that other tradition, no matter from where we come.”

Roxana Amed, vocals
Guests:
Chucho Valdes (Cuba), vocals
Niño Josele (Spain), vocals
Pedro Aznar (Argentina), vocals
Chico Pinheiro (Brasil), vocals
Julio Reyes Copello (Colombia), vocals
Tony Succar (Perú), vocals
Linda Briceño (Venezuela), vocals

Roxana Amed
Argentina’s Roxana Amed is a dusky, virtuosic singer songwriter whose music blends South American folk traditions with sophisticated rock and post-bop jazz.

A postgraduate in Spanish literature and film school student, she has earned acclaim for her albums with fellow Argentine multi-instrumentalist and former Pat Metheny bandmember Pedro Aznar including 2004’s Limbo and 2006’s Entremundos. More albums followed, in 2010’s Cinemateca Finlandesa, a duo album with pianist Adrián Iaies (Latin GRAMMY® nominee), Inocencia in 2011, followed by 2013’s La Sombra de Su Sombra, with pianist Frank Carlberg featuring the poems of Alejandra Pizarnik.

Since relocating to Miami in 2013, Amed has worked with a bevy of globally minded luminaries including Guillermo Klein, Emilio Solla, Leo Genovese, Frank Carlberg, and vocalists Christine Correa and Sofia Rei, among others.

In 2017 was commissioned, with Brazilian pianist André Mehmari, to pay tribute to the legendary Astor Piazzolla at the Buenos Aires International Jazz Festival. She earned a scholarship to pursue her master’s degree in vocal jazz graduating in 2018 with a performance award. Along with being embraced by American audiences, she remains connected to her home country. Amed is a recipient of the Carlos Gardel Award for Argentine Music and the Martin Fierro Award for best song in a TV production.

In 2019, she returned with Instantáneas, an album of live-in-studio performances including her rendition of Joni Mitchell‘s Blue. Amed, exclusive author for Sony Music Publishing, has written for different artists in various genres. For ten years she has led a memorable vocal workshop for hundreds of jazz vocalists at the Buenos Aires International Jazz Festival and she is currently teaching as a professor at the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami and Miami Dade College, as well as in her private studio, working on her training method for popular music singers.

In 2021, she released Ontology, which featured her group with pianist Martin Bejerano and found her interpreting songs by Wayne Shorter, Alberto Ginastera, Miles Davis, and own repertoire.

In August 2021 she is awarded the “New Jazz Works” grant supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation through Chamber Music America to write new music to be performed and recorded in 2022 and on September 28th, 2021, her album Ontology receives two Latin GRAMMY® Awards nominations for Best Latin Jazz/Jazz Album and Best Arrangement categories.

This album contains no booklet.