Octopus Millennium Jazz Orchestra & Joan Reinders

• 1 Evolution 07:06
• 2 Stature 06:02
• 3 Moving Forward 07:09
• 4 Environment 07:33
• 5 Food 06:25
• 6 Procreation 09:21
• 7 Enemies 09:41
• 8 Camouflage 10:29
• Total Runtime 01:03:46

Info for Octopus

A suite of 8 modern big band compositions by Joan Reinders with influences from jazz and classical music.

Octopus is the 10th release of Millennium Jazz Orchestra, one of the finest big bands in The Netherlands. Conductor Joan Reinders writes modern compositions with influences from jazz and classical music.

Octopus is a suite inspired by the unique creature that the octopus is. It has eight tentacles and hence this work consists of eight parts.

The octatonic scale, which consists of eight tones and in which the full and half distances regularly alternate, is the musical theme or Leitmotiv of this suite. The unity of the eight pieces is also important, in which the emphasis is on surprise and idiosyncrasy, without losing the unity.

What else is there to know? Octopi have a very unusual physique. The octopus moves by jet-propulsion. Among cephalopods, the octopus is one of the worst swimmers. Food of the octopus includes crabs, lobsters, fish and sometimes even other cephalopods.

Do octopi practice sex? Not really, a male and female will only seek each other out in order to reproduce. All this, and more, is set to music by the Millennium Jazz Orchestra.

Millennium Jazz Orchestra
Joan Reinders, conductor

Joan Reinders
recipient of the 2003 Peter Schilperoort Award for his outstanding contribution to Dutch jazz—has succeeded in transforming an ordinary provincial big band into one of the Netherlands' premier jazz orchestras.

Years of close collaboration have created a deep, intuitive rapport between Reinders and the orchestra regarding his arrangements and compositions. Together, they are steadily building a growing repertoire of newly composed and arranged works, giving the ensemble a distinctive new identity. This allows the big band to remain contemporary and innovative while staying rooted in the jazz tradition. Firmly established in the eastern Netherlands, the MJO aims to maintain its status as one of the country's finest big bands.

The Millennium Jazz Orchestra
is a pure jazz orchestra with professional Dutch, German, English and Brazilian musicians. Since 1990 the orchestra, under Joan Reinders’ leadership, plays a regular monthly concert in Theater Bouwkunde in Deventer (NL), featuring a famous nationally or internationally soloist like Toots Thielemans, Dick Oatts, Kenny Wheeler, Benny Golson, New York Voices, Claudio Roditi, James Moody, Lew Tabackin, Jiggs Whigham, Bobby Shew, Herb Geller, Lee Konitz, Ernie Watts, Charlie Mariano, The Four Freshmen, Bud Shank, Pete Christlieb, Philip Catherine and many others.

The orchestra has played in many theatres and music halls in the Netherlands and Germany, such as the Concertgebouw Amsterdam and North Sea Jazz Festival. In January 2006 the Millennium Jazz Orchestra and singer Fay Claassen were invited to perform at the International Association for Jazz Education, which took place in New York.

This album contains no booklet.