Eric Alexander & Harold Mabern program

Tuesday Page 6

OCT 27

Page 6

7:30 pm

ERIC ALEXANDER , tenor saxophone & HAROLD MABERN, piano

Just Friends Jazz Series Pavilion

Sponsored by

Steve & Chris

EDMONDS

We are pleased to partner with the Lied Center of Kansas to present the Just Friends Jazz Series.

Page 7

OCT 27 | Eric Alexander & Harold Mabern

Selections will be announced from the stage.

There will be no intermission.

ERIC ALEXANDER “…a tenor saxophonist who can play at all tempos, in all registers, and never without swinging mightily.” George Kanzler, Hot House Eric Alexander started piano lessons at the age of six. He took up the clarinet at nine and switched to alto sax three years later. The tenor sax became his obsession at Indiana University Bloomington, 1986-87. After transferring to William Paterson College in New Jersey, he studied with Harold Mabern, Joe Lovano, Rufus Reid and others.

Alexander’s notes on his influences The people I listened to in college are still the cats who are influencing me today. The legacy left by Bird and all the bebop pioneers, that language and that feel—that’s the bread and butter of everything I do. George Coleman is a big influence because of his very hip harmonic approach. And I’m still listening all the time to Coltrane because I feel that—even in the wildest moments of his mid- to late-60s solos—I can find these little kernels of melodic information and employ them in my own playing.

In 1991 Alexander competed against Joshua Redman and Chris Potter in the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition. Placing second, this launched him into the whirlwind life of a professional jazz musician. He played with organ trios on Chicago’s South Side, made his recording debut with Charles Earland (Muse Records, 1991), and cut his first album as a leader, Straight Up (Delmark, 1991).

More recordings followed for numerous labels, including Milestone. In 1997 he put out Man with a Horn. The following year saw the release of Solid!—a collaborative quartet session with George Mraz, John Hicks and Idris Muhammad—as well as the first recording by his sextet One for All. Alexander has appeared on record as a leader, sideman, producer, and composer.

By now, he has lost count of how many albums feature his playing; he guesses 60 or 70. He has earned praise from critics and, even more important, established his own voice within the bebop tradition.

In 2004, Alexander signed an exclusive contract with HighNote Records, an independent jazz label based in New York City. There he has amassed a considerable discography of critically acclaimed recordings. Most recent among them is Touching, and Chicago Fire.

Alexander continues to tour the world and play to capacity audiences. Making his home in New York City, he performs regularly in clubs around the city and appears frequently at Smoke on the Upper West Side.

OCT 27 | Eric Alexander & Harold Mabern

Page 8

HAROLD MABERN Harold Mabern, one of jazz’s most enduring and dazzlingly skilled pianists, was born in Memphis, a city that produced saxophonists George Coleman and Charles Lloyd, pianist Phineas Newborn Jr. and trumpeter Booker Little. He was an unsung hero of the 1960s hardbop scene, performing and recording with many of its finest artists, and only in recent years has he begun to garner appreciation for his long-running legacy in jazz and the understated power of his talent; as critic Gary Giddins has written, “With the wind at his back, he can sound like an ocean roar.”

During his over half-century on the scene as sideman and leader, he has played and recorded with such greats as Lee Morgan, Sonny Rollins, Hank Mobley, Freddie Hubbard and Miles Davis, just to name a few. “I was never concerned with being a leader, I just always wanted to be the best sideman I could be. Be in the background so you can shine through,” noted Mabern.

Mabern’s notes on his background There were some fine jazz musicians in Memphis, like Phineas Newborn, Jr., who I’ve always said was a musical genius. But if you wanted to make a living as a jazz musician in Memphis, you were also forced to play rhythm and blues music. At the time, we all thought it was taking away from our time with jazz. But now I realize what a joy it was. It takes a special kind of feel that all great improvisers like Charlie Parker and Clifford Brown understood. In fact, I think of myself as a blues pianist who understands jazz. Every day, even when I’m not practicing, I’m thinking about music.

Most of the songs I’ve ever written are away from the piano while I’m walking down the street humming and whistling.