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Pete Robbins

Pete Robbins (age 35) moved to New York in September, 2002, and immediately became “a welcome presence on the creative music scene” (Time Out New York). He has since performed or recorded with Vijay Iyer, John Hollenbeck, John Zorn, Craig Taborn, Mark Dresser, Ben Monder, Mario Pavone, Kenny Wollesen, Tyshawn Sorey, Dan Weiss, Thomas Morgan, and countless others, and has performed at festivals and clubs in nine different countries. Robbins’ leads “an ambitious ensemble that combines spacious avant-gardism with the melodic punch of rock” (New York Times), and has been called a "style master" (AllAboutJazz.com), "fiercely creative" (Time Out New York), and "a real force" in jazz (pianist Paul Bley). His studio releases “Waits and Measures” (Playscape) and “Do The Hate Laugh Shimmy” (Fresh Sound/New Talent) were both named as top-10 jazz releases in 2006 and 2008, respectively; Robbins's fourth album as a bandleader will be released on May 25, 2010 on his own Hate Laugh Music label. Robbins has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, JazzTimes, JazzWise, Jazzman, and National Public Radio.

Awards

For his compositional achievements, Chamber Music America recently awarded Robbins with their prestigious “New Works: Creation and Presentation” grant as well as their "New Works: Encore" award on behalf of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. Robbins has also been a guest adjudicator for the Brooklyn Arts Council, acts as Managing Director at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music, and works with various organizations in a music education capacity.


Tags

3
Album Review

Pete Robbins Quartet: Pyramid

Read "Pyramid" reviewed by Stefano Merighi


Avevamo lasciato Pete Robbins come protagonista del notevole album con il Transatlantic Quartet (Live in Basel) ed eccolo di nuovo, nel frattempo impegnato in diversi progetti, con un quartetto newyorkese da sogno, composto da Vijay Iyer, Eivind Opsvik e Tyshawn Sorey. Pyramid è un album un po' particolare, che assembla materiale originale a riletture di classici pop, con un montaggio piuttosto leggero, che non lascia trapelare speciali disegni espressivi. Si percepisce un'atmosfera rilassata e amicale, sorridente, legata ...

3
Album Review

Pete Robbins: Pyramid

Read "Pyramid" reviewed by Glenn Astarita


New York-based saxophonist, composer Pete Robbins has been on a fast- track, surging to the upper echelon of global jazz talent. And Pyramid rekindles impressions of drummer, composer John Hollenbeck's early 2013 release Songs I Like A Lot, where specific pop and rock songs from yesteryear, inspire the artists to execute a personal reinterpretation or refresh via the essence of modern jazz frameworks. Moreover, Robbins reaps the positive benefits of a superstar-like supporting band, including the recent recipient of a ...

136
Album Review

Pete Robbins Transatlantic Quartet: Live In Basel

Read "Live In Basel" reviewed by Mark Corroto


Like most modern jazz players, alto saxophonist Pete Robbins works in multiple bands, playing varying styles and disciplines of this thing called jazz. Sounds reasonable, yes? But, thirty years ago this wasn't possible. Musicians, listeners, and jazz critics (let's not leave them out) had to take sides, choose categories and labels to classify and compartmentalize their music. You were either a traditionalist, a fusion advocate, or an avant-garde specialist. Neither the twain shall meet. Sound like politics in America today?

849
Interview

Pete Robbins: Balance Dream

Read "Pete Robbins: Balance Dream" reviewed by Gordon Marshall


Pete Robbins is all about balance, in temperament and as an artist. He produces a polished sound on his alto saxophone, with a light tone betraying corners of darkness and complexity. Already an accomplished leader at 31, he grafts his sound onto ensembles of varying sizes with aplomb and equanimity. His style as a leader is distinctive. Just as distinctive are the contributions of his disciplined band members, heeding Robbins' swift directives but always sustaining a fine weave of individual ...

284
Album Review

Pete Robbins: siLENT Z Live

Read "siLENT Z Live" reviewed by Mark F. Turner


Since his 2002 debut, Centric (Telepathy Records), saxophonist Pete Robbins has charted a centrifugal trajectory, moving outward from traditional boundaries. His previous releases--Waits & Measures (Playscape, 2006) and Do The Laugh Hate Shimmy (Fresh Sound New Talent, 2008)--incorporated elements of jazz, rock and electronics with thought-provoking writing and improvisation. Incessantly stirring the creative juices in any number of projects/ensembles, this release documents Robbins' siLENT Z band, at New York's Cornelia Street Cafe and would prompt the question of how his ...

310
Album Review

siLENT Z: siLENTZ

Read "siLENTZ" reviewed by Elliott Simon


Downstairs at the Cornelia Street Café in the Village is one of the more intimate places to see live jazz in the city. The program there is intentionally eclectic and siLENT Z Live, from altoist Pete Robbins, captures his angular group in those comfortable environs. All other things being equal, the make or break for a live recording is the extent to which the performances thus immortalized remain fresh enough to endure repeated listening. Is the spontaneity ...

336
Album Review

Pete Robbins: Do The Hate Laugh Shimmy

Read "Do The Hate Laugh Shimmy" reviewed by Wilbur MacKenzie


Altoist Pete Robbins' Do The Hate Laugh Shimmy functions like a treatise on synthesis, where disparate influences are not so much juxtaposed as woven together with style and grace. This CD makes a clear statement that these are times that celebrate a storied history of musical innovation. What felt like a gradual exploration of evolving alternatives in the 20th Century is now reaching a level of refinement, where today's innovators are synthesizing the work of predecessors who had done the ...

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5

Contest

Enter the "Pete Robbins - Pyramid" Giveaway at All About Jazz!

Enter the "Pete Robbins - Pyramid" Giveaway at All About Jazz!

Source: All About Jazz

All About Jazz members are invited to enter the “Pete Robbins - Pyramid“ giveaway contest starting today. We'll select FIVE winners at the conclusion of the contest on June 16th. Click here to enter the contest (Tracking Pete Robbins at AAJ automatically enters you in the contest.) Good luck! Pete Robbins on Pyramid Pyramid represents a flourishing of my long-standing musical relationships with bassist Eivind Opsvik and drummer Tyshawn Sorey, as well as my long-hoped-for collaboration with MacArthur Fellow and ...

1

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Pete Robbins

Jazz Musician of the Day: Pete Robbins

Source: Michael Ricci

All About Jazz is celebrating Pete Robbins' birthday today!

“I like Robbins’ playing,” wrote Cadence reviewer Jason Bivins. “He’s got vision in his writing and improvising and the focus to bring it out in the open.” Pete Robbins (born 11/28/78) moved to New York in September, 2002, and immediately became “a welcome presence on the creative music scene.” He leads his groups Centric, sILENT Z, and the Robbins/Pavone/Sorey Trio at New York venues such as the 55 Bar... Read more. ...

44

Recording

Pete Robbins Transatlantic Quartet - Live in Basel (2012)

Pete Robbins Transatlantic Quartet - Live in Basel (2012)

Source: Something Else!

Both Pete Robbins' band and music represents reaching across from one space to another. The aptly named Transatlantic Quartet consists of musicians on either side of the “pond," starting with the Massachusetts saxophonist Robbins joined by his Irish bassist Simon Jermyn living in NYC, Canadian drummer Kevin Brow living in Copenhagen and guitarist Mikkel Ploug who splits his time between his native Copenhagen and Berlin. The music does its own “reaching across," from advanced modern jazz to indie rock, but ...

123

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Pete Robbins

Jazz Musician of the Day: Pete Robbins

Source:

All About Jazz is celebrating Pete Robbins' birthday today!

“I like Robbins’ playing,” wrote Cadence reviewer Jason Bivins. “He’s got vision in his writing and improvising and the focus to bring it out in the open.” Pete Robbins (born 11/28/78) moved to New York in September, 2002, and immediately became “a welcome presence on the creative music scene.” He leads his groups Centric, sILENT Z, and the Robbins/Pavone/Sorey Trio at New York venues such as the 55 Bar...“I like Robbins’ ...

62

Recording

Pete Robbins - Silent Z Live (2010)

Pete Robbins - Silent Z Live (2010)

Source: Something Else!

By Pico Jazz that's hard to categorize is usually the kind of jazz that's also hard to describe adequately with words but also the kind of jazz I prefer. And if it swings and grooves, so much the better. Alto saxophonist Pete Robbins' music has all those qualities and then some. We delighted in the unpredictable, nearly uncategorizable funk-rock-avant-jazz of his Do The Hate Laugh Shimmy from 2008. To follow up Hate Laugh, Robbins wanted to capture the immediacy of ...

78

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Pete Robbins

Jazz Musician of the Day: Pete Robbins

Source:


61

Interview

Saxophonist Pete Robbins Interviewed at All About Jazz

Saxophonist Pete Robbins Interviewed at All About Jazz

Source: John Kelman

Pete Robbins is all about balance, in temperament and as an artist. He produces a polished sound on his alto saxophone, with a light tone betraying corners of darkness and complexity. Already an accomplished leader at 31, he grafts his sound onto ensembles of varying sizes with aplomb and equanimity. His style as a leader is distinctive. Just as distinctive are the contributions of his disciplined band members, heeding Robbins' swift directives but always sustaining a fine weave of individual ...

138

Recording

Pete Robbins - Silent Z Live (Hate Laugh Music)

Pete Robbins - Silent Z Live (Hate Laugh Music)

Source: Master of a Small House

Concert versus studio. That enduring dichotomy of setting is a driving factor in altoist Pete Robbins' fourth release. His third was a studio affair; one that while deemed an overall success by the altoist didn't quite muster the intensity of his live work. This set, pulled from a pair of dates at Brooklyn venues, has intensity to spare thanks in no small part to the colleagues convened for the occasions. The other obvious determinant is Robbins' songbook, an eclectic assemblage ...

315

Recording

Pete Robbins' Silent Z Live to be Released May 25 on Hate Laugh Music

Pete Robbins' Silent Z Live to be Released May 25 on Hate Laugh Music

Source: Fully Altered Media

Pete Robbins' “siLENT Z Live" To Be Released May 25, 2010 On Saxophonist's Own Hate Laugh Music

Release Shows Scheduled For May 28 at Tea Lounge in Park Slope, Brooklyn May 29 at Cornelia Street Cafe in East Village

Live recordings may be a cliche in rock music, but in jazz--as bandleader Pete Robbins notes--they are the very measure of the music. They reveal exactly what a group is made ...

136

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Pete Robbins

Jazz Musician of the Day: Pete Robbins

Source: Michael Ricci

All About Jazz is celebrating Pete Robbins' birthday today!

JAZZ MUSICIAN OF THE DAY Pete Robbins

“I like Robbins’ playing,” wrote Cadence reviewer Jason Bivins. “He’s got vision in his writing and improvising and the focus to bring it out in the open.” Pete Robbins (born 11/28/78) moved to New York in September, 2002... more

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Follow Pete Robbins

Put AAJ's Musician of the Day box ...

“Mr. Robbins, an industrious and venturesome alto saxophonist and clarinetist, leads...an ambitious ensemble that combines spacious avant-gardism with the melodic punch of rock...[He has] a cool tone and a thoughtfully off kilter sensibility.…[C]omplex but welcoming... Mr. Robbins plays with coolness as well as confidence. ...[H]is compositions seem to breathe according to some collective whim." (Nate Chinen, New York Times) "No doubt, Robbins’ third solo outing looms as a logical progression of his spiraling notoriety within global jazz circles....A compelling and irrefutably, entertaining effort...Robbins should win over a horde of admirers with this outing, which conveys asymmetrical parts chops, gusto, funk, fusion and a clear-sighted view of the jazz canon

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Primary Instrument

Saxophone, alto

Willing to teach

Advanced only

Credentials/Background

Managing Director, Brooklyn Conservatory of Music (bqcm.org)

Clinic/Workshop Information

leads workshops across the US and Europe on contemporary improvisation and composition

Photos

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Pyramid

Hate Laugh Music
2014

buy

Live In Basel

Hate Laugh Music
2012

buy

Live in Brooklyn

Not Two Records
2011

buy

siLENTZ

Hate Laugh Music
2010

buy

siLENT Z Live

Hate Laugh Music
2010

buy

Do The Hate Laugh...

Fresh Sound Records
2008

buy

Waits and Measures

From: Waits & Measures
By Pete Robbins

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