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John La Barbera

John La Barbera is a Grammy® nominated composer/arranger whose writing spans many styles and genres. His works have been recorded and performed by Buddy Rich, Woody Herman, Count Basie, Dizzy Gillespie, Mel Torme, Chaka Khan, Harry James, Bill Watrous, and Phil Woods just to name a few. Though his major output has been in jazz, he has had works performed and recorded for symphony orchestra, string chamber orchestra, brass quintet, and other diverse ensembles. Most recently, Mr. La Barbera was chosen from among dozens of applicants to participate in the Jazz Composers Orchestra Institute at UCLA. As a result, John was one of sixteen composers commissioned by the JCOI to compose new works that meld jazz and symphonic music. “Morro da Babilonia” was the resulting work and was presented by the American Composers Orchestra in New York City at Columbia University’s Miller Hall. His “Drover Trilogy” for string orchestra and corno da caccia was recorded by the late Dr. Michael Tunnell and has recently been released on Centaur Records. John’s Grammy® nominated big band CD “On The Wild Side“ along with “Fantazm,“Caravan” and his latest “Grooveyard” on Origin Records®, have been met with tremendous artistic and commercial success and are on the way to becoming jazz big band standards. As co-producer and arranger for The Glenn Miller Orchestra Christmas recordings (In the Christmas Mood I & II) John has received Gold & Platinum Records and his arrangement of “Jingle Bells” from those recordings can be heard in numerous films including the Academy Award winning film “La La Land.” John is also the co-founder of “The Diva Jazz Orchestra” the all women jazz big band established in New York City in 1992. Mr. La Barbera is a Professor Emeritus of Music at the University of Louisville’s School of Music and an international clinician/lecturer whose topics range from composing/arranging to intellectual property and copyright. Among his numerous organizational affiliations are Jazz Education Network, Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, NARAS, American Composers Forum, Chamber Music America, and a writer/publisher member of ASCAP since 1971.

John’s Sunday morning big band jazz radio show, “Best Coast Jazz” on WFPK was a mainstay on public radio for over twenty years and was streamed worldwide. He is a two-time recipient of The National Endowment for The Arts award for Jazz Composition and has served as a panelist for the NEA in the music category.

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36
Album Review

John La Barbera Big Band: Grooveyard

Read "Grooveyard" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Composer/arranger John La Barbera has been at the top of his game for more than half a century, and Grooveyard is simply another example of his undiminished artistry. Besides arranging everything--superbly, as always--La Barbera wrote six of the session's ten charming songs, escorting other treasures by Carl Perkins, Dave Brubeck, Curtis Fuller and Elvin Jones. As he writes his handsome and colorful big-band charts, La Barbera is always careful to observe Rule No. 1: they have to ...

5
Album Review

The John La Barbera Big Band: Grooveyard

Read "Grooveyard" reviewed by Nicholas F. Mondello


The geometry, if you will, of a terrific big band recording is such that the three major elements--the players, the arrangements, and the performance--balance in every regard. Grooveyard from the John La Barbera Big Band is such an offering. The album features ten masterfully selected, arranged, and performed selections, each containing outstanding section, solo, and ensemble playing. Wes Montgomery's “Grooveyard" launches a hip, swinging first course in which tenor man Pat La Barbera and guitarist Brandon Coleman ...

4
Album Review

John La Barbera Big Band: Caravan

Read "Caravan" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Summoning Juan Tizol's travel-worn “Caravan" to raise the curtain on a big-band album poses a challenge for any arranger, one that John La Barbera easily brushes aside on the third recording as leader of his own ensemble. And while “Caravan" dazzles in La Barbera's capable hands, it is merely the opening salvo in a session that smolders from end to end, clearly rivaling and and some ways even trumping his Grammy Award-nominated debut album, On the Wild Side.

7
Album Review

John La Barbera Big Band: Caravan

Read "Caravan" reviewed by Nicholas F. Mondello


The beautiful Mediterranean island of Sicily--and the triple-legged image on its national flag--are also known as the “Trinicria." That name translates as--and also describes--the triangular shape of the island. Whether that's a geo-historical lesson or not, the three La Barbera Brothers--John, Joe and Pat have established themselves as a most formidable familial trio in jazz history, right up there with the Joneses, Heaths, Adderleys, Breckers, and others. And, with Caravan that La Barbera legacy will assuredly continue to resonate.

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Catching Up With

The La Barbera Brothers: Jazz DNA

Read "The La Barbera Brothers: Jazz DNA" reviewed by Nicholas F. Mondello


It's an interesting phenomenon how certain families enter and distinguish themselves in this marvelous world of jazz--The Joneses, Heaths, Candolis, Royals, Breckers, Mangiones, and others. Over the last five decades--even many more if one goes farther back to when they were young children playing in the family band with Mom and Pop--the La Barbera Brothers--John, Joe and Pat have graced stages with pantheon artists such as Bill Evans, Buddy Rich, Buddy DeFranco, DIVA, Tony Bennett, Elvin Jones and many more. ...

141
Album Review

The John La Barbera Big Band: Fantazm

Read "Fantazm" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Fantazm is the second album by the John La Barbera Big Band, following last year's impressive debut, On the Wild Side. While the songs are new, almost everything else, we are happy to report, remains invariable--even the band's personnel is essentially the same, with guitarist Larry Koonse added on two tracks. La Barbera's charts (he arranged everything) are once again superb, his hand-picked crew of West Coast heavyweights deciphers them flawlessly, and John's brothers, tenor saxophonist Pat and drummer Joe, ...

145
Album Review

The John LaBarbera Big Band: On the Wild Side

Read "On the Wild Side" reviewed by Jack Bowers


Good things, it has been said, come to those who wait. Well, we've waited a long time for John La Barbera, the middle third of the multi-talented La Barbera brothers, to record his first big-band album, and it's good. Check that; it's better than good--much closer, one might reasonably argue, to spectacular. As a composer and arranger, La Barbera knows how to make a big band swing like there's no tomorrow; one doesn't spend nearly two decades playing and writing ...

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1

Recording

John La Barbera: Grooveyard

John La Barbera: Grooveyard

Source: JazzWax by Marc Myers

Jazz has long been blessed by a sizable number of sibling musicians. Most notably, there are the Joneses (Hank, Elvin and Thad), the Montgomerys (Wes, Buddy and Monk), the Mangiones (Chuck and Gap), the Heaths (Jimmy, Percy and Albert “Tootie" Heath), the Turrentines (Stanley and Tommy), the Adderleys (Cannonball and Nat), the Youngs (Lester and Lee), the Candolis (Pete and Conte), the Breckers (Michael and Randy) and the Marsalises (Branford, Wynton, Delfeayo and Jason Marsalis). Add to the list the ...

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Recording

John La Barbera's Latest CD 'Fantazm' Now Available on Jazz Compass Records

John La Barbera's Latest CD 'Fantazm' Now Available on Jazz Compass Records

Source: All About Jazz

Grammy® nominated composer/arranger, bandleader John La Barbera premiers his latest jazz Big Band CD, Fantazm (Jazz Compass JC1011). Fantazm, John La Barbera's follow-up to his 2004 Grammy nominated On The Wild Side CD, is a collection of standards and originals inspired by something Duke Ellington once said: “...a little thing that the theme is taken from... the kind of a dream that you have about that kind of a girl... it's called Fantazm." Featuring brothers Pat La Barbera on saxes, ...

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

Grooveyard

Origin Records
2023

buy

Caravan

Jazz Compass
2014

buy

Fantazm

Jazz Compass
2005

buy

On the Wild Side

Jazz Compass
2004

buy

Grooveyard

From: Grooveyard
By John La Barbera

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