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James Chirillo
Raised in Bellevue, Washington, guitarist James Chirillo has been privileged to work with many of the swing era’s recognized greats, including Benny Goodman, Buck Clayton, Benny Carter, Eddie Durham, Eddie Barefield, Earle Warren, Frank Wess, and Joe Wilder to name just a few, and as a charter member of the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra, he worked closely with musician/educators Gunther Schuller and David Baker.
Today, his collaborations include appearing regularly with the Jazz At Lincoln Center Orchestra directed by Wynton Marsalis, as well as work with such diverse artists as Paquito D’Rivera, Wycliffe Gordon and Michael Feinstein. He has been a participant on countless recordings – with Tony Bennett, Joe Lovano, Houston Person, Marcus Roberts, and Dick Hyman, on the soundtracks of Woody Allen’s Sweet and Lowdown, Everyone Says I Love You and also movies such as Sam Mendes’ Revolutionary Road and Martin Scorsese’s The Aviator. As a long time member of clarinetist Kenny Davern’s quartet he recorded several discs, including In Concert at the Outpost Performance Space.
His recording debut as leader — Sultry Serenade — was selected by the director of the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University Dan Morgenstern as one of his top five Critics’ Picks for the Year 2000 in Jazz Times magazine, and as one of critic C. Michael Bailey’s Top Ten List of Jazz Releases for 2000 at allaboutjazz.com. In 2010 He was a member of the all-star/onstage band for the Broadway run of Twyla Tharp’s Come Fly Away featuring the music of, and playing the original arrangements written for, Frank Sinatra, and also held the guitar chair for the 2013-14 Broadway show, After Midnight with musical direction by Wynton Marsalis.
Since “After Midnight” he has continued working with the AM band now known as Andy Farber & his Orchestra. In the fall of 2016 he began teaching at the Juilliard School, NYC as a member of the jazz faculty.
As a composer, The National Endowment for the Arts awarded him a 1995 Jazz Composition Grant for his Homage Concerto for Clarinet and Jazz Orchestra, written for clarinetist Ken Peplowski. To celebrate their bi-centennial, he premiered his Grainger Suite, written for and commissioned by the US Military Academy Jazz Knights at West Point, NY. He wrote for and conducted cornetist Warren Vaché with the Scottish String Ensemble in Glasgow for his recording on the Arbors label, Don’t Look Back. His compositions have also been commissioned and recorded by the 48-piece Gotham Wind Symphony.
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Andy Farber and His Orchestra: Early Blue Evening
![Read "Early Blue Evening" reviewed by Jack Bowers](https://s3.amazonaws.com/allaboutjazz/coverart/large/46259d995f681342ad8e55309e158d08.jpg)
by Jack Bowers
Saxophonist Andy Farber's New York-based orchestra came together and cut its teeth as the onstage band for three hundred performances of After Midnight, a Broadway revue that paid tribute to Jazz Age nightclub luminaries from Duke Ellington, Jimmie Lunceford and Count Basie to Harold Arlen, Dorothy Fields and Jimmy McHugh. As one might presume from the orchestra's provenance, echoes of Ellington and Basie can readily be discerned on its first recording since After Midnight closed in 2014--but Farber, who wrote ...
read moreJames Chirillo: Sultry Serenade
![Read "Sultry Serenade" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey](http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B00004WFCE.01._PE_SCMZZZZZZZ_.jpg)
by C. Michael Bailey
Move. James Chirillo debuts as a leader with a superb guitar jazz disc. As soon as I would like to compare Mr. Chirillo to, say, a Joe Pass, a Herb Ellis, or a Charlie Byrd, I would just as soon say he was a Teddy Wilson on guitar. Urbane, that is how I would describe James Chirillo. He is more Oscar Peterson than Art Tatum and more Gene Harris than either. Chops to spare, Chirillo wastes no notes. He is ...
read moreMark Shane's X-Mas Allstars: What Would Santa Say?
![Read "What Would Santa Say?" reviewed by Ed Kopp](https://s3.amazonaws.com/allaboutjazz/coverart/large/055acf2dfed614fc0d3c216378a4f89c.jpg)
by Ed Kopp
There's a dearth of new Christmas jazz releases this season, but here's one to stuff in your stocking. What Would Santa Say? is a very enjoyable collection of familiar holiday tunes done up in a swinging trad-jazz style.Mark Shane is a New York City pianist well known for his stride work. On these 14 holiday tunes he also demonstrates a thorough familiarity with Teddy Wilson's accessible approach to swing piano and a Louis Prima-like vocal style. Shane is ...
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