1.
Two Bass Hit 6:32 2. McDavid 8:19 3. Merav
6:01 4. Daahoud 7:28 5. Renewal 5:27 6. The
Most Beautiful Girl 5:43 7. Bye Ya’ll 9:25 8.
Blewz 6:51 9. Fresh Love Song (Bo’I Yalda) 5:27
10. Mamacita 5:43 11. Kineret 9:25
Personnel: YOTAM - guitar, voice & goud,
Aaron Goldberg piano Christian McBride bass,
Gregory Hutchinson drums Special Guest, Roy
Hargrove trumpet (tracks 4&10)
Produced
by: John Lee Executive Producer: Lisa Broderick
Price:
$7.25
Features Christian McBride,
Aaron Goldberg, Greg Hutchinson and Special Guest Roy Hargrove
On Resonance, his
debut for Jazz Legacy Productions, accomplished Israeli
guitarist-composer Yotam (full name Yotam Silberstein) has one
foot firmly planted in his bebop roots while also showcasing
his love of Brazilian music, American blues, Jamaican reggae
and Israeli folk songs. Tying this highly eclectic program
together is Yotam's exceptional, rhythmically assured
six-string work, which is marked by his inviting warm tones,
clear articulation and penchant for free flowing
improvisation. The New York-based guitarist is joined on this
potent offering by the stellar rhythm section of Christian
McBride on bass, Aaron Goldberg on piano and Greg Hutchinson
on drums. Special guest trumpeter Roy Hargrove also appears on
faithful recreations of Clifford Brown's "Daahoud" and Joe
Henderson's "Mamacita."
"Aaron, Christian,
Greg and Roy, in my opinion, are a few of the giants of their
generation," says Yotam. "I was very honored to have them on
the record. We have have forged a special chemistry together.
And I think you can hear that on the album."
His strongest, most
expressive and fully realized outing to date, Yotam's third
recording as a leader stands as a notch above his previous two
outings, 2004's The Arrival (recorded when he was still living
in Jerusalem) and 2009's Next Page, a solid organ quartet date
featuring Sam Yahel, Willie Jones III and Chris Cheek.
From pure bop numbers like Dizzy Gillespie-John Lewis vehicle
"Two Bass Hit" and the Clifford Brown staple "Daahoud" to
Brazilian flavored originals like "McDavid" and "Bye Y'all" to
the angular, Monkish "Blewz" and the lyrical gem "Fresh Love
Song," Yotam and company cover a wide range of musical styles
on Resonance. Hutchinson provides the authentic reggae
one-drop feel on the Monty Alexander original "Renewal" while
McBride contributes some stirring counterpoint on Yotam's
darkly beautiful, chamber-like number "Merav," which he named
for his girlfriend and dedicates to two significant
compositional influences in Benny Golson and Clare Fischer.
Yotam and his
all-star crew come out of the gate swinging hard with a
supercharged rendition of Dizzy's bop anthem "Two Bass Hit."
Right away, the guitarist showcases his superb facility,
flowing over the changes while slyly dropping in quotes from
Dizzy's "Manteca" and "Ooo-Bop-Sha-Bam" in the middle of his
impressive solo. The whole band provides crisp execution and
great drive throughout and everybody gets a solo taste here,
including an outstanding bowed bass solo from McBride and a
furious traversing of the kit by Hutchinson.
While Yotam does have an affinity for swinging full-bore in
the bop and post-bop idioms, he is quick to point out that
there are other aspects to his musical makeup that he wanted
to address on Resonance. "I love playing bebop but I wouldn't
say that is where I come from," he says. "When I was in high
school I used to study a lot of bebop tunes. For three or four
years I would only listen to bebop, but I'm not this way
anymore. Nevertheless, it let its mark on me. And in the same
way that I studied to become a bebop player, I became a
Brazilian music fanatic for the last three or four years. I'm
playing gigs with Brazilian cats now. I guess that's the best
way to learn."
"McDavid"
is a vibrant bossa nova number that has Yotam supplying some
authentic Brazilian styled comping and also features another
killer solo from McBride. "This is probably one of my only
happy tunes," says Yotam. "Most of the tunes I write tend to
be kind of sad. So I fooled everybody on this one."
The mysterious
sounding minor key ballad "Merav" is a delicately beautiful
number that has Hutchinson playing coloristically on the kit
and also features Yotam nonchalantly double-timing the tempo
on his outstanding solo. A brisk run through the bop staple "Daahoud"
showcases Hargrove's brilliant trumpet playing while Yotam
supplies some Wes Montgomery styled octave work on "Renewal,"
written by another of Yotam's mentors. "For the last year or
so I'm very fortunate to have been working in Monty
Alexander's band," he explains. "He's a great influence. I
kind of fell in love with this piece of his and decided that I
wanted to play it on this album."
"The Most Beautiful
Girl" is a romantic ballad underscored by Hutchinson's gentle
brushwork. Yotam and Goldberg turn in particularly lyrical
solos here. The guitarist explains that the tune is one he
remembers from his childhood. "That's an Israeli childrens
song that I grew up on and that I really like to play on gigs.
So it's a song from my past that I've embraced more recently.
I think I was really amazing to bring that piece from my
childhood in Israel to the session and let those guys play it
and see what happened. And I like the results."
From that sensitive
number, Yotam and crew launch into the aggressively angular
"Bye Y'all," whose title has a double meaning. As Yotam
explains, "This song has a north Brazilian rhythm from Bahia
called baiao, so it's a kind of play on words that way.
Thelonious Monk, whose playing was a kind of influence on this
tune, also has a piece entitled 'Bye Ya.' So it's also a play
on words there." The urgent "Blewz" opens with a tricky, Monk-ish
head featuring some tight unisons between Yotam and pianist
Goldberg. The piece resolves to a 12-bar form that has Yotam
blowing with the audacious facility of a Pat Martino, another
huge influence during his development as a player.
The minor key lament
"Fresh Love Song," Yotam's interpretation of an Israeli pop
tune from the '70s by Shlomo Gronich, has him doubling
throughout on an exotic-sounding stringed instrument. As he
explains, "It's a fretless, 11-string instrument and it sounds
like the Arabic oud, so I call it the 'goud.'" Yotam adds,
"It's a tune I love and I think I kind of took it to another
place. I just hope the guy who wrote it is going to be happy
with the way it came out here."
Yotam's take on the
Joe Henderson classic "Mamacita" (from the 1967 Milestone
album, The Kicker) gives everyone in the band, including
special guest Hargrove, a chance to stretch out on solos. And
the album closes on an introspective note with the
chamber-like meditation "Kineret," which has Yotam providing
some Djangoesque filigrees along the way. "It's the Hebrew
name for the Sea of Galilee," he explains. "It's a very
peaceful sounding number that kind of reminds me of the Sea of
Galilee. And it's really dedicated to the Brazilian composer
Chico Buarque.
Born and raised in Tel-Aviv, Israel,
Yotam started playing guitar at the age of 10, focusing mostly
on rock and blues. He was soon after accepted into the
prestigious Alon High School for the Arts, where he studied
jazz with such great teachers as Walter Blanding and Amit
Golan. During his high school years, Yotam won many local
competitions and was heralded as a very promising young
guitarist. At age 18, he joined the IDF (Israel's Army) and
served as a musical director, arranger and lead guitarist for
three years. During his military service he gained recognition
and began playing with many of Israel's top jazz musicians.
At 21, Yotam won the prestigious
"Israeli Jazz Player of the Year" competition with his trio
and was asked to perform at Italy's renowned Umbria Jazz
Festival. The same year, Yotam released The Arrival on the
Fresh Sound New Talent label. The success of his highly
acclaimed debut album enabled him to tour extensively
throughout Europe and the Middle East.
In August of 2005, Yotam received a scholarship to further his
jazz studies at the New School in New York City. Less than a
month later, he was selected as one of 10 top guitar players
to participate in the semi finals of the distinguished 2005
Thelonious Monk International Jazz Guitar Competition. In
2009, in addition to releasing his second release, he toured
with the Sam Yahel Trio, opening for Steely Dan in major
concert halls.
Since then he has played in many of the
city's great venues with great jazz artists like James Moody,
Benny Golson, Curtis Fuller, Louis Hayes, Jimmy Heath, Frank
Wess, Junior Mance, James Spaulding, Pat Martino, Antonio
Hart, Slide Hampton and Dizzy Gillespie Alumni All-Stars to
name a few.
At age 28, Yotam has already made some
significant inroads on the New York jazz scene. He shows great
promise for the future, and Resonance is a huge step in the
right direction.
