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David Virelles

Recently named one of four young pianists on the rise by the New York Times, Cuban born pianist and composer David Virelles grew up in a musical home. His father is a professional singer-songwriter and his mother is a flautist in the Santiago de Cuba Symphony. He started studying classical music at the age of seven, as well as being exposed to the large array of Cuban music styles. Eventually, David discovered his grandfather’s jazz collection and also became interested in that tradition.

In 2001, he left for Canada as a protégé of Canadian musician Jane Bunnett, with whom he recorded several albums (two of them Grammy nominated), toured and collaborated with on a number of projects.

While in Canada, David graduated from the music program at Humber College. He studied privately with pianist Barry Harris and has also studied composition with the influential composer Henry Threadgill, which had a profound impact in Virelles’ artistry.

Over the years he has performed and/or recorded with: Steve Coleman and Five Elements, Henry Threadgill, Dewey Redman, Sam Rivers, Hermeto Pascoal, José Luis Quintana “Changuito”, Stanley Cowell, Rudresh Mahantappa, Horacio “El Negro” Hernández, Mark Turner, Paul Motian, Ben Street, Chris Potter, Ravi Coltrane, Jeff Ballard, Miguel Zenón, Wadada Leo Smith, among others.

In 2003 he became the first recipient of the Oscar Peterson prize, presented by Peterson personally. His debut album, Motion, was released in 2007 on the label Justin Time, after winning the Grand Prix de Jazz Award at the Montréal Jazz Festival that year.

Virelles’ current group is also named Continuum, featuring bassist Ben Street, legendary drummer Andrew Cyrille and percussionist Román Díaz, who continue to develop his artistic concepts. His anticipated album under the same name was released on October 23rd, 2012 by New York based jazz label Pi Recordings.

The album is an exploration of both notated and spontaneous composition with each track delving into different aspects of ritual practices that still thrive in Virelles’ homeland. Each track on Continuum is about a different myth or symbol related to belief systems found in Afro-Cuban folkloric traditions. David Virelles also worked closely with Cuban painter and sculpture Alberto Lescay, who created a series of twenty paintings that are inspired by the music of Continuum and some of which are featured on the record.

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Album Review

Henry Threadgill: The Other One

Read "The Other One" reviewed by Giuseppe Segala


Giunto sulla soglia delle ottanta primavere, Henry Threadgill non lascia sbiadire la propria splendida vitalità creativa. Lo ha fatto quest'anno sia con la pubblicazione dell'imperdibile autobiografiaEasily Slip into Another World, che con una nuova realizzazione discografica, The Other One. Pure questa imperdibile, si colloca tra i lavori che lo hanno visto impegnato esclusivamente come compositore e direttore dell'ensemble, non in qualità di strumentista e solista, sulla traccia dei precedenti Old Locks and Irregular Verbs, del 2016, e Double ...

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Album Review

Johnathan Blake: Passage

Read "Passage" reviewed by Dave Linn


The drummer Johnathan Blake was born in Philadelphia in 1976. His father was the esteemed jazz violinist and educator John Blake Jr. who played in many diverse settings, (most notably Archie Shepp and McCoy Tyner), before releasing seven albums under his name. He died in 2014. Blake (the son) began studying music at a young age, later attending William Paterson University studying with Rufus Reid and Steve Wilson. He eventually received a master's in composition at Rutgers University where he ...

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Album Review

Henry Threadgill: The Other One

Read "The Other One" reviewed by John Ephland


Listening to Henry Threadgill's music, the bobbing and weaving doesn't maintain a continuity but can jump from one strand to another, one scene to another, as in a dream. It is tonal and not, just as dreams are, perhaps, rhapsodic or unkempt, the story or plot being as tangible, fungible as a summer breeze. Much is made of Threadgill's chamber-music esthetic. And rightly so. It is “so chamber music precise it must all be premeditated, right?" asked the ...

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Album Review

Henry Threadgill Ensemble: The Other One

Read "The Other One" reviewed by Troy Dostert


Now that Henry Threadgill has begun receiving the accolades he has long deserved--the Pulitzer Prize he won in 2016 for In for a Penny, In for a Pound (Pi Recordings, 2015) being just the most prominent example--it is impressive to find him still relentlessly stretching himself as a performer and composer. Since his first forays into the jazz avant-garde in the 1970s, the maverick multi-instrumentalist has always made music that challenges listeners in exciting ways, but it is his uncanny ...

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Radio & Podcasts

David Virelles, Flora Carbo, Transatlantic Five & Anthropology Band

Read "David Virelles, Flora Carbo, Transatlantic Five & Anthropology Band" reviewed by Maurice Hogue


Highlights of a very packed show: pianist David Virelles and trio (Ben Street bass & Eric McPherson drums); Australian saxophonist Flora Carbo; England's Anthropology Band; pianist Russ Lossing with NYC's King Vulture; the powerful German-American quintet, Transatlantic Five (Ken Vandermark sax, Nate Wooley trumpet, Christopher Dell vibes, Christian Ramond bass & Klaus Kugel drums), and a whole lot more, plus a peek at the catalogue of European free jazz drumming icon, Sven Åke Johannson.. Roll tape!!! Playlist Sam ...

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Liner Notes

David Binney: Barefooted Town

Read "David Binney: Barefooted Town" reviewed by Josef Woodard


Continuing Saga of the Strong Seeker I remember distinctly during the 2007 Montreal Jazz Festival, sifting through and measuring up the usual blur of stimuli, seeking out the prizes among prizes in the program. In one corner, there was Wayne Shorter, in the finest of his performance I'd ever heard—playing up his suits as composer and soloist by meshing his free-wheeling quartet and the score-heeding Imani Winds. And then, in another corner, as part of the late night haunt of ...

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Radio & Podcasts

David Virelles, Amanda Whiting, Marco Mezquida, Mamud Band & More

Read "David Virelles, Amanda Whiting, Marco Mezquida, Mamud Band & More" reviewed by Ludovico Granvassu


It's just early July and there's no denying that we're already feeling the effects of climate change, with unusually high temperatures and extreme events like floods or severe thuderstorms. When it comes to music, however the downpour of new releases is a very welcome development... especially when they sound so delicious!Happy listening!Playlist Ben Allison “Mondo Jazz Theme (feat. Ted Nash & Pyeng Threadgill)" 0:00 Mamud Band “Equalization" Equalization—Single (Garrincha) 0:16 Host talks 6:18 Amanda Whiting “Lost" ...

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Recording

Four New Releases From ECM Records: Vijay Iyer Sextet, Tim Berne's Snakeoil, Gary Peacock Trio, and David Virelles

Four New Releases From ECM Records: Vijay Iyer Sextet, Tim Berne's Snakeoil, Gary Peacock Trio, and David Virelles

Source: Universal Music Group

August 25 Vijay Iyer Sextet Far From Over Vijay Iyer: piano, fender rhodes; Graham Haynes: cornet, flugelhorn, electronics Steve Lehman: alto saxophone; Mark Shim: tenor saxophone; Stephan Crump: double bass Tyshawn Sorey: drums Keyboardist-composer Vijay Iyer’s energized sequence of ECM releases has garnered copious international praise. Yet his fifth for the label since 2014—Far From Over, featuring his dynamically commanding sextet—finds Iyer reaching a new peak, furthering an artistry that led The Guardian to call him “one of ...

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Award / Grant

David Virelles Wins the Louis Applebaum Composers Award

David Virelles Wins the Louis Applebaum Composers Award

Source: All About Jazz

Composer and pianist David Virelles has won the Louis Applebaum Composers Award. This year's $10, 000 award recognizes excellence in a body of work by an emerging artist in the field of jazz composition. Born and raised in Santiago de Cuba, to a musical family, David Virelles started to play the piano at the age of 7 and began composing at age 13. Classically trained in one of Cuba's prestigious music schools, Virelles developed an interest in jazz listening to ...

"The young Cuban-American pianist, already an MVP sideman to iconoclastic leaders like Henry Threadgill and Steve Coleman, offered an ambitious, assured debut album, saturated with poise, proficiency and duende." #3 - —Time Out New York albums of the year

“This is my jazz artist of the year. He’s another amazing Cuban pianist and mixes old rumba mystique with free jazz." —Gilles Peterson Jazz artist of the year

"This young Cuban pianist’s new album, “Continuum” (Pi Recordings), moves backward, forward and sideways through history. Intuitive and original, it’s equally of the American experimental jazz tradition, Afro-Cuban religious culture and modern nonjazz composition. It’s got nerve and soul and memory." —Ben Ratliff, New York Times, no.1 Album of 2012

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Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

The Other One

Pi Recordings
2023

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Passage

Blue Note Records
2023

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For Loved Ones

Dream Gold Soul
2023

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Nuna

Pi Recordings
2022

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Asp Nimbus

Out Of Your Head Records
2021

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The News

ECM Records
2021

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Lei Do Indigenato, 1914

From: Recognition
By David Virelles

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