Bob Rockwell, Ben Sidran, Billy Peterson, Leo Sidran - Bob's Ben: A Salute to Ben Webster

Styles: Jazz, Post Bop
Year: 2005
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 62:37
Size: 144,6 MB
Art: Front

(4:26) 1. Prelude For Ben
(7:01) 2. Bye Bye Blackbird
(4:27) 3. Time On My Hands
(4:59) 4. Old Folks
(7:17) 5. This Can't Be Love
(4:52) 6. That's All
(3:40) 7. Sunday
(4:44) 8. Time After Time
(3:58) 9. Danny Boy
(4:26) 10. La Rosita
(4:07) 11. Tenderly
(5:13) 12. Bounce Blues
(3:21) 13. In The Wee Small Hours

Ben Webster was one of several giants of the tenor saxophone, though his contributions sometimes have not been as greatly appreciated as those of Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young. Bob Rockwell, an American expatriate who had been living and working in Copenhagen for a couple of decades, was honored with a stipend from the Ben Webster Foundation in the city to make a tribute recording in honor of the late saxophonist. Rockwell is well accompanied by pianist Ben Sidran, bassist Billy Peterson, and drummer Leo Sidran (the pianist's son).

Prior to the session, the leader sought out as many of Webster's original charts as he could find, and he decided to stick with Webster's choice of keys and tempi, also utilizing the same chord substitutions. But this is no mere carbon copy of Ben Webster's recordings. Though Rockwell has a big tone, he is not as breathy and manages to convey his own sound in spite of taking inspiration from Webster's arrangements. He does a beautiful job with the ballads, displaying a lyrical touch that the honoree would have enjoyed, especially in "Danny Boy" and "Old Folks," while overdubbing a harmony line in "La Rosita." All in all, a fine effort. By Ken Dryden
https://www.allmusic.com/album/bobs-ben-a-salute-to-ben-webster-mw0001434524

Personnel: Tenor Saxophone – Bob Rockwell; Piano – Ben Sidran; Bass – Billy Peterson; Drums – Leo Sidran

Bob's Ben: A Salute to Ben Webster

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Leo Sidran - What's Trending

Styles: Jazz Pop
Year: 2023
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 49:11
Size: 113,8 MB
Art: Front

(3:31) 1. What's Trending
(3:26) 2. Keep It Wild
(3:58) 3. When The Mask Comes Off
(4:13) 4. It's Alright
(3:07) 5. Everybody's Faking
(3:34) 6. Crazy People
(3:16) 7. Hanging By A Thread
(4:03) 8. There Was A Fire
(4:47) 9. 1982
(3:31) 10. Spin
(4:12) 11. Nobody Kisses Anymore
(3:27) 12. After Summer's Gone
(4:00) 13. Sleepwalking

What's Trending is Leo Sidran’s eighth solo record. In many ways it picks up where his celebrated 2021 release The Art Of Conversation left off. If The Art was a “hymn to empathy” (El Pais, Spain) and “a treasure chest of intimate and introspective portraits of family life during the pandemic” (West Coast Soul, Germany), this latest release is a hip, deeply personal exploration of how music can make life more livable in difficult times
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He does it with easy humor, great grooves and a vocal delivery - direct, approachable, conversational that leaves the impression he is singing only to you, telling your story while he tells his own. Being a multi-instrumentalist (he plays most of the instruments on the record) gives him the advantage of crafting songs of detailed yet lush subtlety. They are small universes that explore ideas of identity, history, social discourse, and the richness of every-day life. He draws from jazz, r&b, lofi hiphop, singer-songwriter and even pop, yet always lands on his own two feet. His songs, as pop musician Steve Miller once said, “stand and deliver”.

The title track “What’s Trending” was inspired by Leo’s 11 year-old daughter, Sol, who he says “is the ultimate trend follower, always showing me some new meme, dance or internet phenomenon, and always armed with the phrase ‘look at this, it’s trending.’” The irony of today’s trend becoming tomorrow’s fad is not lost on Leo. And Sol, who appears on the track as well as a handful of others on the record, sings with a maturity that belies her youth. Leo himself began recording professionally when he was in his teens (Steve Miller recorded four of his songs when Leo was only 15), so there is something of a sense of continuity coursing through the project.

That continuity is there in the song “There Was A Fire” which features both Leo’s daughter and his father, jazz musician Ben Sidran. In fact “There Was A Fire” is inspired by the elder Sidran’s book of the same name, which explored the Jewish contribution to popular music in America. The title is based on a legend of Jewish origin from the 18th century about the importance of remembering who you are and where you came from.

And where Sidran comes from is a place of great music and great musicians. As on his previous projects, here he counts on the collaboration of a select handful of friends as featured guests, including Janis Siegel (of the Manhattan Transfer), Louis Cato (bandleader of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert), Jon Lampley (of The Huntertones), Jake Sherman, Lauren Henderson, and Michael Leonhart (of Steely Dan) among others. And once again, almost all of the collaborators on the project have also been guests on Sidran’s celebrated podcast The Third Story.

Some of the songs on What’s Trending respond to the turmoil of modern life, in one moment hopeful (“It’s Alright”) in another humbled (“Hanging By A Thread”), in yet another introspective (“Sleepwalking”), and finally celebratory (“When The Mask Comes Off”). “Keep It Wild”, “Nobody Kisses Anymore” and “After Summer’s Gone” all channel Sidran’s devotion to classic love songs. We hear it in “Nobody Kisses Anymore” when he laments: “Nobody takes the time to write, nobody’s using punctuation”, a nod to the slippery slope of informality in modern life.

“Everybody’s Faking”, “Crazy People”, and “Spin” likewise explore the place of truth, or lack thereof, in today’s world, while “1982,” is a nostalgic look-back, constructed using only the titles of popular songs released during that year. Huey Lewis, Michael McDonald, Toto, The Police, Hall and Oates, Stevie Wonder, Steve Miller - the iconic artists of Leo’s childhood - all come through clearly in the music.

As Leo Sidran proves, the exploration of ‘what’s trending’ doesn’t have to simply be a jaundiced look at today’s social circus. It can be fun, funny, warm, wishful and downright inspirational, just like the songs he produces.
https://leosidran.bandcamp.com/album/whats-trending

Personnel: Leo Sidran: drums, percussion, bass, guitars, keyboards, piano. vibraphone, lead and backing vocals; Louis Cato: guitar and scat solo 4; Max Darmon: bass 6; Mark Dover: clarinet solo 8; Joy Dragland: vocals 2, 5, 6; Angela Faith: vocals 4; Ben Flocks: saxophone solo 3; Michael Hearst: theremin, saw, strings, effects 7; Lauren Henderson: vocal 11; Peter Hess: woodwinds 8; Jon Lampley: brass 6; Michael Leonhart: trumpet, 1 Orlando LeFleming: acoustic bass; Jake Sherman: harmonica solo 11; Janis Siegel: vocals 4; Ben Sidran: vocal 8; Sol Sidran: vocals 1, 4, 7; Zelta Sils: ghost vocal 7; John Sneider: trumpets 8; Rich Stein: percussion 5, 7, 13; Michael Thurber: bass & vocal 3; Nina Zeitlin: vocals 8, 9, 10

What's Trending

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