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Stu Mindeman

Introduced to the piano at four years of age, Stu Mindeman spent his formative years in Santiago, Chile, and Chicago, Illinois, and quickly realized that he wanted to pursue a life in music.

Stu maintains a busy performance schedule throughout the world, both on stage, and behind the scenes, as a composer, arranger, and producer.

Stu has performed and recorded with numerous world-class artists, including Branford Marsalis, Kurt Elling, Gloria Estefan, Ana Tijoux, Francesca Ancarola, Miguel Zenón, Antonio Sanchez, Kirk Whalum, Dave Weckl, James Genus, Jeff "Tain" Watts, Howard Levy, Kendrick Scott, Juan Pastor, Marquis Hill, Makaya McCraven and many others. Stu has also been active in the world of theater, musically directing for Chicago's The Second City comedy troupe.

His debut album of original music, "In Your Waking Eyes: Poems by Langston Hughes", was released in 2014 to critical acclaim.

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Album Review

Carlos Vega: Art of the Messenger

Read "Art of the Messenger" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan


Tenor saxophonist Carlos Vega is a steeped-in-the-tradition fan of early bebop, displaying his passion for the genre with his nods to alto saxophonist Charlie Parker on Bird's Ticket (2016) and Bird's Up (2017), both on Origin Records. With Art Of The Messenger he shifts his focus to Art Blakey, the drummer who led the Jazz Messengers from 1955 onward for thirty-five years, helping define—in the early years—the hard bop Blue Note Records approach to jazz. Vega and his ...

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Album Review

Carlos Vega: Art of the Messenger

Read "Art of the Messenger" reviewed by Jack Bowers


In case you didn't quite catch the “message" subtly embedded in the title of Chicago-based tenor saxophonist Carlos Vega's new recording, Art of the Messenger, here is a brief reminder that it was drummer Art Blakey who formed the Jazz Messengers in the mid-1950s and led the celebrated hard-bop ensemble until his death in 1990. The Messengers' roster of alumni reads like a Who's Who of Jazz Hall of Fame members. With that in mind, Vega assembled ...

Album Review

Stu Mindeman: Woven Threads

Read "Woven Threads" reviewed by Angelo Leonardi


"Wowen Threads" è una metafora per intrecciare cose diverse in un'unica dimensione. Lo considero un lavoro molto intimo in quanto lega le mie esperienze di musicista jazz nord americano con quanto ho appreso lavorando in Sud America, specialmente in Cile." Con queste parole Stu Mindeman presenta quest'album registrato sia in Cile con musicisti locali (le cantanti Francesca Ancarola e Ana Tijoux, il bassista Milton Russell, il batterista Carlos Cortes Diaz) che negli Stati Uniti con artisti di primo ...

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Catching Up With

Stu Mindeman and trio explore a Chick Corea classic at the Chicago Jazz Festival

Read "Stu Mindeman and trio explore a Chick Corea classic at the Chicago Jazz Festival" reviewed by Corey Hall


When reflecting on his 1968 recording Now He Sings, Now He Sobs, Chick Corea shared the following with jazz journalist Don Heckman: “The title...comes from I Ching, an ancient Chinese book that I was into in the '60s when I was studying different philosophies and religions. It's also known as the Book of Changes. And it has a section named “Now He Sings; Now He Sobs--Now He Beats The Drum; Now He Stops." The poetry of that phrase ...

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Album Review

Hans Luchs: Time Never Pauses

Read "Time Never Pauses" reviewed by Budd Kopman


While it does not scream downtown, avant-garde, uber originality, guitarist Hans Luchs debut recording, Time Never Pauses, is far from a vanilla, “jazz as style" offering, and, in fact has much going for it. For one thing, his band, consisting of drummer George Fludas, bassist Clark Sommers, pianist Stu Mindeman and Shaun Johnson on trumpet is extremely tight, precise and, in many spots, smoking. Luchs does not dominate the session, and is part of the rhythm section for ...

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Album Review

Hans Luchs: Time Never Pauses

Read "Time Never Pauses" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey


Chicago-based guitarist Hans Luchs draws more from the recent than far past. More John Abercrombie and John Scofield than Wes Montgomery or Grant Green. His debut recording Time Never Pauses is a collection of eight original compositions and two transformed standards reveals the continued refining of modern jazz composition well past the head-solo section-head style of hard bop and the liquid freedom of post bop into pure composition. “Der Lumenmeister," the album opener is labyrinthian in both ...

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Album Review

Hans Luchs: Time Never Pauses

Read "Time Never Pauses" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Not much can be said about Hans Luchs aside from the fact that he lives in Chicago, looks to be fairly young and plays an intense, assertive and agile guitar on Time Never Pauses, which, incidentally, is Luchs' recorded debut as leader of his own group. Luchs is also a writer who composed eight of the album's ten selections (the others are Duke Ellington's “Come Sunday" and Cole Porter's “Get Out of Town") and arranged all of them.

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Rift

Calligram Records
2024

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Cachito

Self Produced
2023

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Noli Me Tángere

Next Level
2022

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Art of the Messenger

Origin Records
2021

buy

El Regreso

Self Produced
2019

buy

Woven Threads

Sunnyside Records
2018

buy

Art of the Messenger

From: Art of the Messenger
By Stu Mindeman

Videos

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