Awake / the music of Don Cherry
“Don Cherry’s music has been left in the more than capable hands of Jamie Breiwick as he delivers a touching tribute to Cherry’s monumental achievements.”-Imran Mirza, UK Vibe
"Awake/The Music of Don Cherry" hopefully will push younger listeners to discover the work of Don Cherry (1936-1995) as well as discover the impressive recordings of Jamie Breiwick.-Richard B Kamims, Step Tempest“
This is an excellent evocation of Don Cherry's spirit, as well as a demonstration of the communication that a trumpet trio can achieve.”-Mark Sullivan, All About Jazz
"On Awake, Breiwick has a little more space to work with, and rather than rushing to fill it, he patiently works his way through gently melodic passages and giddy ripples."-Scott Gordon, Tone Madison
"Then “Brown Rice” grounds us ingeniously with a lumbering bass and uncanny trumpet sounds, almost like a serpentine specter emerging from a rice paddy. Throughout this album, a winged reincarnation – unfettered yet purposive, loving life – pushes the music into earthly fecundity, even as it flies."-Kevin Lynch, Shepherd Express
“Yep, a white cat from semi rural Wisconsin can lead a trumpet trio on the works of Don Cherry and have nothing to apologize for. A wonderful note perfect set that captures the hell raiser on the money throughout, this is a fun set that doesn't let you down or leave you feeling ‘if only he...". A solid work out by a real pro, lefty jazzbos ought to do themselves a favor and check this out.”-Chris Spector, Midwest Record
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liner notes:
One of the most important qualities that a practitioner of artistic endeavors can possess is that of curiosity. The spark that impels one to see what’s out there, to find out and to know more is much the same as that impulse that sets the artist on the pathway towards creation.
This sort of inquisitiveness is a quality that Jamie Breiwick shares with the subject of his musical investigations on this recording, trumpeter and multi-instrumentalist Don Cherry. For the peripatetic Cherry, upending the jazz trumpet tradition as musical co-conspirator in Ornette Coleman’s revolutionary quartet was only the beginning of a wide ranging and well traveled arc of discovery; his explorations resulted in an incredible body of genre-defying music that influenced not only jazz musicians but creators in every corner of the music world. Breiwick has been an intrepid explorer in his own sphere, conducting heartfelt and knowing investigations of the intersection where classic jazz vocabulary and contemporary sensibility meet in band projects such as the Lesser Lakes Trio, as well as most convincingly essaying the music of such an iconic figure as Thelonious Monk in his Dreamland project.
Awake, devoted to the compositions of Don Cherry, is another such accomplished foray by Breiwick. In a program that includes both cherished favorites from the Cherry “songbook” such as Art Deco and lesser-known (but no less influential) works such as Brown Rice, Jamie abundantly exhibits the depth of his understanding of Cherry’s music even as he showcases his exuberant skill and creativity as an improvisor. His command of the the jazz trumpet continuum, from vocabulary-based specificity to the gestural and illusive approach pioneered by Cherry, is comprehensive, organic, and swinging! The imaginative treatment of Cherry’s work by Jamie, in the company of the excellent bass/drums duo of Tim Ipsen and Devin Drobka, similarly shows Jamie’s desire to make fresh, non-cliched music using the full range of what he hears and likes.
Whenever I’m in my hometown of Milwaukee, I make it a point to seek out Jamie on one of his gigs, and each time afresh I marvel at how much music he knows, how well he plays, and how dang enjoyable it is to listen to him. Listening to this album, a most worthy addition to his expanding recorded oeveure, pleasantly reminds me of the brilliance of this estimable musician’s work. I invite you to listen to the music of Awake and enjoy its many splendors, as a prelude to a continuing engagement with the art of this important voice from the heartland.
- Brian Lynch, 2019
Recorded May 31, 2019 at Clown Horn Studios
Engineered by Devin Drobka
Mixed by Daniel Holter at Wire & Vice / Milwaukee, WI
Mastered by Brian Schwab / Chicago, IL
Cover painting "Atmosphere" by Jeff Redmon
credits
Jamie Breiwick - trumpet, pocket trumpet
Tim Ipsen - bass
Devin Drobka - drums
Header image - Don Cherry with his cornet during the recording session for his Where is Brooklyn album. November 11, 1966. © Francis Wolff
"At first, in music, there are open fields, oceans, forests. Later they build structures, edifices of harmonic and melodic materials, walls. Rhythm is solid, inflexible, stone. Oceans freeze, forests are razed for lumber and paper is filled with arcana, math, absolutes are found. Much later, time, duress, the elements and conflicts erode these structures. Cities become ruins, melting oceans create rivers which create new forests of fresh sound from the black soil of The Tradition. The harmonic walls that once stood here are now as lines on the road. Harmonies and melodies go where they will, unimpeded but informed by the past. This is where the Breiwick / Velleman Duo roams. These musicians have passed through evolutions as musicians, personal epochs of musical development. Both are deeply rooted in the holy language of American music. Some call it jazz. Both can hit the changes, any changes at damn near any tempo. Jamie is a master musician who has attained at a very young age for this art. There is nowhere he cannot move in the physics of this world, the world of Music. He will modestly dispute this, but his work causes involuntary profanities to come from otherwise puritanical conversationalists. 'Holy S***'. Barry is an architect. Barry is an intergalactic musical traveller. He has been there, done that, done there, been that. Barry can turn an uninterested, boisterous mob into a congregation of hungry listeners, accepting his phrases and inventions eagerly. Jamie will tell you that Barry is the Master. Jamie is right."
- Steve Peplin
Jamie Breiwick - trumpet
Barry Velleman - piano
recorded 6/19/2011 recorded, mixed, and mastered by Dan Gnader at eDream Studios
Milwaukee, WI
photo, Ari Rosenthal