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Uri Caine

Uri Caine was born in Philadelphia and began studying piano with Bernard Peiffer. He played in bands led by Philly Joe Jones, Hank Mobley, Johnny Coles, Mickey Roker, Odean Pope, Jymmie Merritt, Bootsie Barnes and Grover Washington. He attended the University of Pennsylvania and studied music composition with George Rochberg and George Crumb.

Since moving to New York City Caine has recorded sixteen albums as a leader. His first two CD's "Sphere Music" and "Toys" paid homage to the great jazz pianists Thelonious Monk and Herbie Hancock. His third CD, "Urlicht/Primal Light", featured arrangements of the music of Gustav Mahler and won the international "Composer's Hut" award for Best Mahler CD of 1997. In "Wagner in Venezia" , Caine arranged the music of Richard Wagner for a small ensemble playing live at the Café Quadri in St. Mark's Square, Venice. His next CD, "Blue Wail", included original compositions for a piano trio and featured Ralph Peterson and James Genus. That same year while touring Uri recorded "Gustav Mahler in Toblach"live at the Gustav Mahler Festival in Toblach/Dobbacio, Italy. In 1999 he released "The Sidewalks of New York" a tribute to early Tin Pan Alley. In 2000 Caine released a version of Schumann's ‘‘Dichterliebe'' song cycle, "Love Fugue", and a new version of "The Goldberg Variations". In 2001, three new CD's were released-"Solitaire" for solo piano, Rio" , recorded live in Rio de Janiero with several groups, and "Bedrock3", a trio featuring electric piano with Zach Danziger and Tim Lefebvre. In 2002 he recorded The Diabelli Variations an arrangement of Beethoven's Opus 120 for piano and orchestra with Concerto Koln. A new cd of Mahler songs, Dark Flame was released in 2003. "Live At The Village Vanguard ", was recorded there in 2004 and featured Drew Gress and Ben Perowsky. His most recent cd is "Shelf-LIfe" with Bedrock.

Recently Caine has received commissions from the Vienna Volksoper, The Seattle Chamber Players, Relache, The Beaux Arts Trio, the Basel Chamber Orchestra and Concerto Koln. The Pennsylvania Ballet performed the "Goldberg Variations" in 2002, choreographed by Val Caniparoli. Caine was the Director of the Venice Biennale for Music in September 2003, where he also premiered his new work "The Othello Syndrome". He has performed his version of the Diabelli Variations with orchestras including the Cleveland Orchestra, the Moscow Chamber Orchestra, the CBC Orchestra in Candada and the Swedish Chamber Orchestra. In June of 2004 the JVC Jazz Festival featured his trio, Bedrock, Mahler, and Goldberg projects at the Village Vanguard. In 2006 he was named composer in residence for the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and premiered his Concerto for Two Pianos and Chamber Orchestra with Jeffrey Kahane in May 2006.

Benjamin Koppel: White Buses: Passage To Freedom

Read "White Buses: Passage To Freedom" reviewed by Doug Collette

by Doug Collette
December 28, 2023

If saxophonist/composer/bandleader Benjamin Koppel has proven anything over the last few years, it is that he has no trouble finding sources of inspiration for his work. Whether it is just for the sake of blowing with a redoubtable rhythm section in the form of bassist Scott Colley and drummer Brian Blade on Perspective (Cowbell Music, 2023) or illustrating his own range of style with The Ultimate Soul & Jazz Revue (Cowbell Music, 2020) and The Art of The ...

Album Review

Franco Ambrosetti: Nora

by Dan McClenaghan
November 14, 2022

Franco Ambrosetti's album is called simply Nora. Short and sweet, four letters, two syllables. But it could easily have been called “Franco Ambrosetti with Strings," as the Swiss flugelhornist & trumpeter follows the orchestral path of alto saxophonist Charlie Parker and his groundbreaking Charlie Parker With Strings (Verve, 1950), trumpeter Chet Baker's Chet Baker with Strings (Columbia, 1953) or trumpeter Clifford Brown's Clifford Brown with String (Verve, 1955). Those early forays into orchestral jazz set the template of ...

Album Review

Erik Friedlander: A Queens' Firefly

Read "A Queens' Firefly" reviewed by Vincenzo Roggero

by Vincenzo Roggero
November 14, 2022

Il violoncello di Erik Friedlander, dolcissimo, introduce la melodia, poi gradualmente le altre voci si aggiungono con delicatezza, quasi con circospezione a dar forma a una ballad sognante. È la title track, il brano che apre il disco e sembrerebbe marcare in qualche modo il terreno, garantire coordinate di viaggio sicure. Succede invece che già la successiva «Match Strikes» sembra perdere il segnale e scombinare traiettorie, con il pizzicato e le svisate del violoncello, le leggere dissonanze ...

Album Review

Erik Friedlander: A Queens' Firefly

Read "A Queens' Firefly" reviewed by Troy Dostert

by Troy Dostert
August 7, 2022

When a cello is your calling card, it is only to be expected that the “chamber jazz" label will tend to follow you around--and so it has for Erik Friedlander, although that term hardly does justice to the variegated possibilities he sets in motion through his assorted projects. Having worked with a “who's who" list of cutting-edge musicians including Myra Melford, Dave Douglas, Sylvie Courvoisier, John Zorn, and countless others including artists well outside the jazz world such as the ...

Album Review

Franco Ambrosetti: Lost Within You

Read "Lost Within You" reviewed by Chris M. Slawecki

by Chris M. Slawecki
June 26, 2021

Lost Within You is a masterpiece of smoldering passion and beauty ignited by the exquisite trumpet and flugelhorn melodies of Franco Ambrosetti. Ambrosetti assembled an enviable ensemble: bassist Scott Colley and drummer Jack DeJohnette in the rhythm section, plus guitarist John Scofield, and Renee Rosnes and Uri Caine switching turns as pianist. But the star of Lost Within You is Ambrosetti's haunting, delicate and graceful sound, revealed in one masterful ballad after another. “Miles Davis was ...

Album Review

Franco Ambrosetti: Lost Within You

Read "Lost Within You" reviewed by Doug Collette

by Doug Collette
March 26, 2021

The Franco Ambrosetti Band Band's Lost Within You is a supremely unassuming listening experience. An all-star band helps the trumpeter composer conjure a sensuous mood that only grows progressively engrossing over the course of the seventy-plus minutes playing time of the album. The seductive sensation is an inexorable process that commences with the very first cut. The second-longest track on the record next to “Body and Soul," Horace Silver's “Peace" features drummer Jack DeJohnette at the piano and ...

Album Review

Franco Ambrosetti Band: Lost Within You

Read "Lost Within You" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan

by Dan McClenaghan
February 8, 2021

Swiss trumpeter / flugelhorninst Franco Ambrosetti opens his Lost Within You with “Peace," from the pen of pianist Horace Silver. The original rendition comes from Silver's Blowin' The Blues Away (Blue Note, 1959). It was a composition that Silver stumbled upon when he was “doodling around on the piano, and it just came to me." It featured Blue Mitchell's characteristically brassy trumpet tone. It was unusual in the Silver songbook—an introspective, patiently deployed ballad, instead of the normal hard-charging, romps ...

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