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Pierrick Pedron

Ten years after having started saxophone in his native Britanny, Pierrick Pédron discovered the world of jazz at the age of 16. 2 years later he entered CIM and got involved in many Funk, Rhythm’n Blues projects. His first records were for Sinclair and jazzman Magik Malik in 1994 and 1995.

Prize-winner of the Défense contest in 1996 with the “Artaud / Blanchet” formation, he continued his experiences within the “Nuits Blanches” gigs at the Petit Opportun concert hall with Lionel Belmondo (Belmondo brothers) and François Théberge, gigs with Alain Jean Marie and an album of Ernie Hammes which took him to New York. In 2000 he came back to France and his first album “Cherokee”.

He has now released a brand new and exciting album.

It was recorded at the Systems Two studios in Brooklyn in November 2005 with Mulgrew Miller on piano, Lewis Nash on drums and Thomas Bramerie on double bass.

This quartet made of French musicians and American stars leads us to think about how do jazz musicians know they’re dealing with one of their own when faced with a colleague they’ve never heard before? Pierrick Pedron had lots of time to ponder those questions when he was preparing this record in Paris before he actually made the record in New York. For one thing, he knew that you don’t just breeze into the capital of modern jazz to record with musicians of the calibre of Mulgrew Miller and Lewis Nash without running a risk: the risk of finding yourself eclipsed on your own album by people with more talents.

As it happened, the Systems Two studio in Brooklyn was the place where Pierrick Pedron did better than not allow himself to be intimidated: in two days of studio-time, not only did he finish an album whose freshness, fluidity and finesse make it a great record, one that hoists its creator above the commonplace, but he also earned the trust and respect of the musicians he’d invited to play alongside him.

“Deep in a Dream” is the exact opposite of a disaster scenario; it’s a waking dream, a wish fulfilled in which music is played, quivering and beaming outwards. The vitality emanating from it, the surge within and the emotions it arouses, those things exist thanks to the empathy inhabiting the men who collectively give life to it, all with the desire to make it more beautiful than the sum of their simple talents.

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151
Album Review

Pierrick Pedron: Cheerleaders

Read "Cheerleaders" reviewed by Bruce Lindsay


Pierrick Pédron grew up in 1980s France listening to Neil Young and the super groups of rock, as well as to saxophone greats such as Charlie Parker and Cannonball Adderley. This combination of early influences can be clearly heard on the French alto saxophonist's third solo album, the fascinating and occasionally enigmatic Cheerleaders. A combination of brass bands, King Crimson, bebop and a touch of Pink Floyd, all centered on Pédron's tight yet lyrical alto sound. It's ...

149
Album Review

Pierrick Pedron: Deep in a Dream

Read "Deep in a Dream" reviewed by Jeff Dayton-Johnson


Deep in a Dream was the jazz event of 2006 in France; alto saxophonist Pierrick Pedron and the album were showered with prizes and dominated journalists' “best-of lists. The explanation that everyone gives for their high marks is surprisingly guileless: the story they tell is one of an emerging figure of the French scene flying to New York City, alto under his arm, to lead a date featuring heavyweights Lewis Nash and (especially) Mulgrew Miller, and triumphing on jazz's home ...

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