Composer | Arranger | Conductor | Woodwinds
On May 10th, 2014 the Carolina Philharmonic will be performing my arrangement of “I Wish I Knew” from the Coltrane Ballads Project featuring saxophonist Jon Gordon. If you live near Southern Pines, NC, be sure to check it out. Jon is an incredible player and will surely bring his own unique perspective to the piece.
Tickets & information here: http://www.carolinaphil.org/
Click here to read the April 2014 Danjam Music Newsletter. If you are not already on the mailing list you can sign up here:
It’s finally here! The video of the September 2013 performance of the Coltrane Ballads Project in Toronto featuring Mike Ruby, John Riley, Arlia de Ruiter, Victor Cheng, and myself is up on YouTube! Both the Danjam & Sneak Peek Orchestras played their butts off. I am very proud of this performance and I am pleased to be able to share it with all of you. Enjoy!
Program (click to jump):
00:36 – Say It (Over & Over Again)
08:04 – It’s Easy to Remember
13:06 – You Don’t Know What Love Is
23:02 – Nancy (With The Laughing Face)
28:50 – What’s New
32:24 – I Wish I Knew
39:02 – All Or Nothing At All
49:15 – Too Young To Go Steady
57:03 – What’s New (encore)
Danjam Orchestra & Sneak Peek Orchestra Present:
COLTRANE BALLADS
Monday September 30th, 2013
Al Green Theatre, Toronto
Mike Ruby: tenor sax
John Riley: drums
Arlia de Ruiter: violin
Victor Cheng: piano
Daniel Jamieson: conductor / arranger
Continue reading “Video: Coltrane Ballads Featuring Mike Ruby”
Many exciting things have happened over the past year in the world of Danjam, so I wanted to take a moment and reflect on some of the highlights as I have been too busy to write regular blog updates.
The most noteworthy endeavour of all was my Coltrane Ballads Project. For those of you who haven’t heard about it yet, I arranged all the music from John Coltrane’s Ballads CD for big band + orchestra. It took me about a year to prepare all the music and it was performed for the first time by the Metropole Orchestra in Amsterdam this past May. I conducted the concert – my first time conducting the Metropole – and it featured the endlessly musical Joe Lovano on tenor saxophone. What a great orchestra – I cannot say enough good things about that band! John Riley traveled from New York to play drums for the week. I love working with John because not only does he play his parts ‘correctly’ so to speak, but each take is equally different, creative and fresh. We had 2 days to rehearse, followed by a day of recording, and on the final evening we performed to a sold-out concert hall in downtown Amsterdam. It was a real treat to be able to perform the music acoustically – no microphones in the orchestra! Here are some photos from that week:
I am very proud of the work we did that week. It was such a great feeling hearing my music come to life, especially after working on it for so long.
As soon as I got back to New York, I moved to a new apartment (and built myself a new bed – yippee!), and quickly started work on 13 new arrangements for Jeremy Davis’ Equinox Orchestra & the Savannah Philharmonic. I spent most of the summer Continue reading “2013: Looking Back”