Common Ground Gary Burton & The New Gary Burton Quartet

• 1 Late Night Sunrise 06:39
• 2 Never the Same Way 07:04
• 3 Common Ground 07:00
• 4 Was It So Long Ago? 06:16
• 5 Etude 05:51
• 6 Last Snow 07:05
• 7 Did You Get It? 05:18
• 8 My Funny Valentine 07:17
• 9 Banksy 06:13
• 10 In Your Quiet Place 07:21
• Total Runtime 01:06:04

Info zu Common Ground

The Grammy-winning pioneer of the four-mallet technique of playing the vibes, Gary Burton, has released his first studio album since 2005. The album also introduces his latest band, known as the New Gary Burton Quartet.

The group consists of guitarist Julian Lage, bassist Scott Colley, and drummer Antonio Sanchez. Common Ground features 10 tunes, including six remarkable originals by quartet members, two impressive numbers by pianist Vadim Neselovskyi (a former Burton band member), a gem from the Keith Jarrett songbook, and an intriguing arrangement of the standard "My Funny Valentine," spotlighting Lage.

"Common Ground has uncommon range of tone and mood and texture for a Burton album, partly because all four players contribute compositions that reflect their contrasting personalities. Sanchez’s “Did You Get It?” is a super-quick asymmetrical postmodern blues that slows only for the composer’s cryptic drum breaks. Few groups can make 7/4 gracefully swing like Colley’s “Never the Same Way.” Lage’s “Etude” sounds classical; the composer and Burton jointly solve its intricate puzzle. Burton’s “Was It So Long Ago?” is a quietly dramatic tango.

But the most memorable piece is an unexpected choice for a band that is all about fresh thinking. Lage opens “My Funny Valentine” alone and takes forever to get to the song, postulating glittering scales and flowing free designs and finally suggesting the melody in chords. Next, Burton and then Colley ruminate over fragments distantly related to the subject at hand. It is exhilarating at the end when the ambiguities crystallize into clarity, and Burton and Lage in turn explicitly acknowledge “My Funny Valentine.” Remarkably, this band’s commitment to fresh thinking has room for shameless romanticism." (jazztimes.com)

Gary Burton, vibraphone, producer
Scott Colley, bass
Antonio Sanchez, drums
Julian Lage, guitar

Gary Burton
"In my early years, I was fortunate to have known and even play with some of jazz’s pioneers. Now I am being recognized as an important figure in jazz history. It is a great honor to be included with the many great artists who have been named Jazz Masters."

Vibraphonist, bandleader, and educator Gary Burton's four-mallet technique on the vibraphone gave the instrument a new musical vocabulary in jazz and a fuller, more piano-like sound than the traditional two-mallet approach. He was one of the progenitors of jazz fusion in the late 1960s, and had a decades-long educational career at the Berklee College of Music.

Burton taught himself to play the vibraphone and, at the age 17, made his first recording in Nashville, Tennessee, with legendary guitarist Hank Garland. With the help of Chet Atkins, another leading Nashville guitarist, Burton secured a record deal with RCA and released his debut album, New Vibe Man in Town, in 1961 while studying at Berklee.

At 19, on a recommendation from Marian McPartland, Burton joined pianist George Shearing’s group, and then worked from 1964 to 1966 with Stan Getz. As a member of Getz’s quartet, Burton was recognized by DownBeat magazine as "Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition" (1965). In 1967, he formed a quartet featuring Larry Coryell, an electric guitarist, as one of the soloists. The quartet's first two albums in 1967—Duster and Lofty Fake Anagram—changed the jazz landscape by adding rock elements to the music. In 1968, he won DownBeat's "Jazzman of the Year" award.

During the late 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, Burton continued to experiment with his sound, recording Carla Bley's album-long piece A Genuine Tong Funeral; performing in various configurations, such as solo, duos, quartets, and with chamber orchestras; and continuing to work in other genres such as country, rock, tango, and classical. At the same time, Burton continued to mentor notable guitarists in his bands, including Pat Metheny, John Scofield, Kurt Rosenwinkel, and Julian Lage.

In 1971, Burton embarked on an education career at the Berklee College of Music as a teacher of percussion and improvisation. In 1985, he became the institution's dean of curriculum. In 1989, he received an honorary doctorate of music from Berklee and, in 1996, he was appointed executive vice president, a position he held until his retirement in 2004.

After his retirement from Berklee, Burton formed several new bands and expanded his collaborations with Chick Corea, Pat Metheny, and other musicians. His Generations band in the early 2000s featured young musicians, and in 2012 he assembled the New Gary Burton Quartet (with Julian Lage, Antonio Sánchez, and Scott Colley) with which he records and performs. Burton has received 22 Grammy nominations and won seven Grammy Awards.

Dieses Album enthält kein Booklet