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Jay Azzolina

Jay grew up in Meriden, Connecticut in a family whose musical diet primarily consisted of Frank Sinatra, Jack Jones, The Beatles and every other British rock group. At age seven, Jay began taking trumpet lessons from his dad (along with a few years of piano). At around eleven, he got his hands on a harmony guitar from his dad's music store and gradually made the Jay's Guitarswitch from brass to strings. After high school, Jay spent a year at the Hartt School Of Music studying classical guitar with Alan Spriestersbach and Dick Provost before moving to Boston and attending the Berklee College Of Music. While in Boston, Jay had the good fortune of studying with Mick Goodrick, Charlie Banacos and Pat Metheny.

After leaving Boston in 1981, Jay moved to New York and entered a multitude of musical settings. His first gig in New York was with violinist Michael Urbaniak, ushering in the next several years of playing fusion music. During this time Jay worked and recorded with Harvie Swartz, and later Spyro Gyra, which earned him a Grammy nomination. In 1989, Jay recorded his first CD as a leader entitled Never Too Late, produced by Teo Macero on Antilles New Directions. During this time, the versatile guitarist was also working and recording with artists such as Dave Samuels, Kenny Werner, Fred Hersch, Jeff Beal, David Mann, Ron McClure, Herbie Mann, Chuck Mangione, Jerry Bergonzi, Marc Copeland and singers Michael Franks, Donna Summer, The Manhattan Transfer, Carly Simon and Rickie Lee Jones.

In 1995, Jay received a Masters of fine arts degree from the Conservatory Of Music at Purchase, NY. During this time he studied composition with Edgar Grana and began teaching at the Conservatory as well as at Manhattanville College.

In 1997, Jay became a member of the John Patitucci band. This group afforded Jay the opportunity to play more expansive music in the acoustic jazz setting. The groups that John put together for tours were always great, especially the one in Mexico City which included Chris Potter and Adam Nussbaum. In January of 2000, Jay recorded his second CD entitled Past Tense on Doubletime Records, which included performances by Patitucci, Potter, and Nussbaum, along with pianist Charles Blenzig and singers Jill Azzolina and Julie Eigenberg. This recording of seven original songs was produced by both Azzolina and Patitucci, marking a new period of playing and writing for Jay.

After a busy year of performing, writing and teaching closer to home, Jay's new compositions have been captured on his latest recording, Local Dialect. On this new project for Garagista Music, the celebrated guitarist does something he's never done on any previous release: Rather than concentrate on one particular genre or theme, he decided to open the doors of his imagination and let the music dictate where it would go. Recorded over the space of a few days at The Cutting Room and Quad Studios in Manhattan, Local Dialect benefits from Janko Radosavljevic's street-smart sonic conception. With his double-barreled background in jazz and hip-hop, the Yugoslavian-born producer invests Azzolina's performances with an urgent, immediate presence.

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Album Review

John Lang: Now Ear This

Read "Now Ear This" reviewed by Jack Bowers


For what it is, bassist John Lang's fourth album, Now Ear This, is quite well done. For jazz fans, the dilemma lies there, precisely in what it is--a series of eleven rock/fusion themes, nine written by Lang, which would be right at home on a smooth jazz/easy listening radio station, for example, but whose jazz content would earn them no more than a tenuous place on any playlist beyond that. Tempos are more or less proximate, as is the steady ...

1
Album Review

Mike Holober: Hiding Out

Read "Hiding Out" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi


Un decennio dopo Quake (Sunnyside 2009), l'arrangiatore e bandleader Mike Holober riporta sotto i riflettori la newyorchese Gotham Jazz Orchestra in uno scintillante doppio compact che raccoglie due ricercate composizioni ("Flow" in tre movimenti, “Hiding Out" in cinque) e tre brani medio-lunghi (tra cui il delizioso “Caminhos Cruzados" di Jobim in due versioni). Come è ovvio che sia, l'organico registra alcune sostituzioni. Tra i nuovi ingressi il trombettista Marvin Stamm, i sassofonisti Jason Rigby e Bill Drewes, il ...

2
Album Review

Mike Holober and the Gotham Jazz Orchestra: Hiding Out

Read "Hiding Out" reviewed by Jerome Wilson


Mike Holober is a celebrated composer and arranger who has worked for ensembles like the Westchester Jazz Orchestra in New York and the WDR and HR Big Bands in Germany. He is also the leader and founder of the Gotham Jazz Orchestra which here makes its first appearance on record in ten years. Holober makes this return a fruitful one, coming up with a 2CD set featuring two long suites, both with themes involving American landscapes. The first ...

3
Album Review

Mike Holober and the Gotham Jazz Orchestra: Hiding Out

Read "Hiding Out" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Mike Holober has been Hiding Out rather openly for the past ten years or so, waiting for the proper time to gather together his world-class Gotham Jazz Orchestra and record for the first time since 2009's widely acclaimed album Quake (Sunnyside), in which his picturesque compositions and arrangements were compared favorably to those of Duke Ellington and Gil Evans, to name only two. In the interim, Holober has hardly been sitting on his hands, serving time as director of New ...

3
Album Review

Mike Holober and the Gotham Jazz Orchestra: Hiding Out

Read "Hiding Out" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


If musical polymath Mike Holober is hiding out, he's doing it in plain sight. Constantly in demand, his work as a pianist, conductor, arranger and composer has drawn plenty of attention. In the past 15 years alone he has served as the Artistic Director and Conductor of the Westchester Jazz Orchestra (from 2007-2013), the Associate Guest Conductor of the hr-Bigband (from 2011-2015), and the Associate Director of the BMI Jazz Composer's Workshop (from 2007-2015). In that same stretch of time, ...

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Album Review

Mike Holober and the Gotham Jazz Orchestra: Hiding Out

Read "Hiding Out" reviewed by Karl Ackermann


Mike Holober's background as a classical pianist and conductor is just one thing that sets Hiding Out apart from the current crop of big band releases. Holober has worked in a variety of settings from solo, duo, and quintet to large ensembles. Two previous recordings with his Gotham Jazz Orchestra were the critically acclaimed Thought Trains (Sons of Sound Records, 2004) and Quake (Sunnyside Records, 2009), comprised of covers and original Holober compositions. On the ambitious double-disc Hiding Out, Holober ...

3
Album Review

AGNZ: Chance Meeting

Read "Chance Meeting" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Before proceeding, a word about the name of this admirable quartet: AGNZ (jazz from A to Z?) comprises the first letter in the last names of its four members--guitarist Jay Azzolina, tenor saxophonist Dino Govoni, drummer Adam Nussbaum and bassist Dave Zinno. It further denotes, presumably, a certain level of parity, a selflessness and camaraderie among equals in which the sum of their efforts is always more decisive than its component parts. Chance Meeting, the group's first ...

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Performance / Tour

Jay Azzolina Trio with Ron Oswanski & Ian Froman in Westchester (NY) on April 10

Jay Azzolina Trio with Ron Oswanski & Ian Froman in Westchester (NY) on  April 10

Source: All About Jazz

Jay Azzolina Trio with Ron Oswanski - Organ Ian Froman - Drums Half Moon 1 High Street Dobbs Ferry, NY 10522 9:30-12:30 Jay grew up in Meriden, Connecticut in a family whose musical diet primarily consisted of Frank Sinatra, Jack Jones, The Beatles and every other British rock group. At age seven, Jay began taking trumpet lessons from his dad (along with a few years of piano). At around eleven, ...

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Now Ear This

Self Produced
2021

buy

Hiding Out

Zoho Music
2019

buy

Chance Meeting

Whaling City Sound
2016

buy

Local Dialect

Self Produced
2007

buy

Live at One Station...

Azziz Records
2002

buy

Past Tense

Double-Time Jazz
2000

buy

Compelled

From: Hiding Out
By Jay Azzolina

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