Updated: May 1, 2024
Born: October 19
”Intelligent” and “Inventive” and “Free-swinging” are some of the words that critics have used to describe pianist and composer Sila Cevikce Shaman's music. Born in Ankara, Turkey, she moved to USA in 1993 to study composition and jazz improvisation where her mentors included Jerry Bergonzi, Joanne Brackeen, Robert Helps and Chuck Owen. For the next decade she has written for, performed and recorded with many ensembles including Kim Bock Quartet, Spindle, Greenwich Blue, Dan McMillion Groovin’ High Big Band, Robin Hackett, SDS Trio, poet laureate Lawson Inada as well as her own quartet featuring Rich Perry and Ari Hoenig. In 2004, her debut album as a bandleader, A New Abode was released on SteepleChase Records. Selected as an Album of the Week pick by NPR's Jazz with Bob Parlocha, this recording has had extensive airplay in the US and Europe. She followed this with several releases from Louie Records and her own WaveEleven label including First Encounters (2009), At the End of the Day (2018) and First Time Again(2019) and They Come Out at Night (2021). Her latest duo album in collaboration with multi-instrumentalist Dave Storrs, Brief West Coast Tour was featured on the best releases of 2020 by Dan McClenaghan of All About Jazz.
For the last decade and a half, due to her interest in collaborative and visual applications of music, she has been composing and recording music for film, theater and multimedia. Her credits include scores for Catskill Chainsaw Redemption, a short film by Emmy winning writer J.R. Havlan of “The Daily Show with John Stewart”; documentary First American Art; documentary 9/11-Ten Years On for History Channel; Being a New Yorker Cartoonist, short film by cartoonist Liana Finck presented by the Daily Forward; music for the play Terrotica, by Brad Krumholz, staged by NACL, the musical satire Spin with book and lyrics by former chairman of the NEA John Frohnmayer, starring David Ogden Stiers, Venezuela for RASTRO Dance Company and the score for Brindlebeast(Hear Me) a new musical in voice, song and American Sign Language with book and lyrics by Anita Riggio.
Her latest projects include the original scores to feature documentary Sisters in Freedom for which she received two 2019 Mid-Atlantic Emmy Awards; the TV pilot Perception by creator/director PJ Posner and virtual performance film Transmission in collaboration with Jeffrey Shaman commissioned by Corvallis-OSU Piano International. She currently lives and works in NYC.
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Sila Shaman: They Come Out At Night
by Dan McClenaghan
Drummer Dave Storrs' Sound Shack—a garage beside his Corvallis, Oregon house, converted into a recording studio—has been open for business for more than two decades. Recordings go down when the mood strikes. The mood strikes often. There must be thousands of hours of unreleased stuff stocked away. So pianist Sila Shaman--who has participated productively in Sound Shack activities, most notably on the terrific Brief West Coast Tour (Louie Records, 2020)—decided to do something about the unreleased aspect of some of ...
read moreDave Storrs' Sound Shack Part 2: Sila Shaman
by Dan McClenaghan
New York-based pianist/composer/producer Sila Shaman lived in Corvallis, Oregon, from 2005 to 2011. She taught there, at Oregon State University, and composed a soundtrack for a satirical musical production at OSU. This professional stint is notable for two reasons: one, it laid some of the groundwork for her current efforts at composing soundtracks for movies and T.V. (the score for the 2019 documentary Sisters In Freedom and music for the T.V. pilot Perception); and two, she crossed paths in the ...
read moreSila Cevikce: A New Abode
by Mark F. Turner
The art of jazz composition and improvisation are fully stated as Turkish born pianist Sila Cevikce provides some solid and noteworthy music on her debut release A New Abode. Since arriving in the U.S in 1993 she has sharpened her skills both academically at Berklee and professionally in performances with New York musicians as well as composing music for film and theater. What quickly becomes apparent is the depth, style, and articulation of Cevikce's muscial ideas which have influences from ...
read more"She has the ability as a writer and soloist to connect the dots; many and many a dot it turns out" CADENCE Magazine "What quickly becomes apparent is the depth, style, and articulation of her musical ideas which have influences from Wayne Shorter to Stravinsky." Mark F. Turner/ All About Jazz
Bill Carrothers
piano
Wayne Shorter
saxophone
JoAnne Brackeen
piano
Aydin Esen
piano
Bill Evans
piano
Herbie Hancock
piano
Kenny Kirkland
piano
Charles Mingus
bass, acoustic
McCoy Tyner
piano
