“Each song has its own mood, its own approach. Some songs are energetic, like ‘Popit’, some are homages to big bands, like ‘Dizzy Atmosphere’, and others have an avant garde edge, like ‘V-Reel’. You don’t just listen to this album, you inhabit it.”
– Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (“Kareem’s Weekend Boost”)
The New York-based David Sanford Big Band (formerly the Pittsburgh Collective) was formed in 2003 and comprises twenty musicians specializing in jazz, avant-garde, classical, funk and Latin genres. Members and soloists have included Hugh Ragin, Jon Irabagon, Anna Webber, Josh Roseman, Mike Christianson, Steven Bernstein, Bruce Johnstone, Chris Washburne, Adam
Kolker, Ted Levine, Tony Kadleck, Hiro Noguchi, Dave Ballou, Lee Odom, and players from the Meridian Arts Ensemble, Boston Musica Viva, the Knights, the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Talea Ensemble, the Denver Neophonic Jazz Orchestra, and most of the prominent big bands in New York City. Along with presenting original works written expressly for the ensemble, the
group performs big band literature that draws heavily on classical idioms (Stravinsky), classical works (Tomkins, Mahler) and popular music (Nick Cave, Sia), as well as jazz standards (Gillespie, Mingus, Elvin Jones).
Notable performances have included the International Association for Jazz Education Annual Conference in New York, NY, the Festival of New Trumpet Music, curated by Dave Douglas, Composer Portraits at Miller Theatre, New York, NY, featuring cellist Matt Haimovitz, the Art of Jazz series at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY, the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced
Study at Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, the Institute and Festival for Contemporary Performance, Mannes School of Music, and the American Academy in Rome Cabaret, New York, NY.
The most recent album, A Prayer For Lester Bowie (Greenleaf Music) was the number 7 jazz album of the year on the Jazz Times magazine critics poll. “Subtraf” from the same album was named one of “The 25 Best Classical Music Tracks of 2021” by the New York Times
Band website: https://www.davidsanford.org/bigband
Greenleaf Music – https://greenleafmusic.com/
