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Kevin Sun

Kevin Sun (b. 1991) is a saxophonist, improvisor, composer, and writer.

Sun’s primary musical vehicle is “Great on Paper” (a.k.a. GOP), which features a typical jazz quartet configuration with a distinctly atypical bent towards the avant-garde and the folkloric. As per its official biography, GOP “taps into the jazz tradition without getting too ideological or self-conscious about it,” and had its premiere performance at Jordan Hall in Boston in April 2014. Aside from performing with GOP, Sun has shared the stage with artists such as Vijay Iyer, James Moody, Kenny Burrell, Dave Liebman, and Rich Perry, among others, and has performed at venues such as Smalls Jazz Club (NYC), Sunside Jazz Club (Paris), Symphony Space (NYC), and Carnegie Hall (NYC).

As a composer, Sun continues to explore open-ended and through-composed musical architectures for quartet and other small configurations. He has also composed for film and radio, as well as spatialized diffusion in electroacoustic settings. “Half-Love Song,” his most recent piece for piano, taped voice, and speaker orchestra, was inspired by T.S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” and was premiered at Thomas Knowles Paine Hall at Harvard University in May 2014.

Sun is currently the editor-in-chief of Jazz Speaks, the official blog of The Jazz Gallery, a not-for-profit jazz cultural center in New York City. He has conducted interviews with artists such as Herbie Hancock, Joshua Redman, Ben Wendel, Steve Lehman, and Linda Oh, among others. He also writes A Horizontal Search, a jazz and literature blog that has been recognized by National Public Radio’s A Blog Supreme and Ethan Iverson’s Do the Math. It can be accessed at: www.thekevinsun.com.

A 2014 graduate of Harvard College (summa cum laude), Sun studied English and was awarded the Thomas T. Hoopes Prize for his senior thesis, a collection of nonfiction essays about jazz and improvisation entitled “‘Making the Hang’ and Other Essays on Being a Young Improvisor.” As an undergraduate, he worked as an associate editor for Fifteen Minutes, the magazine of The Harvard Crimson. His spring 2013 cover article, “Social Class at Harvard,” was a Finalist for the 2013 Associate Collegiate Press Feature Story of the Year. He was also a member of Phi Beta Kappa and the Signet Society.

In the fall of 2014, Sun will continue his studies at The New England Conservatory of Music as part of the Harvard-NEC joint degree program, working toward a Master of Music (M.M.) degree in Jazz Performance, expected May 2015.

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4
Album Review

Kevin Sun: The Depth of Memory

Read "The Depth of Memory" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan


Saxophonist/composer Kevin Sun's 2 CD set, The Depths Of Memory, is said to be more suited to focused listening than to the “convivial distractions of a jazz club." That rings true. From CD 1's opener, “All This Stillness," subdivided into seven sections, the album finds the saxophonist and his bandmates sounding as if they have slipped into a flow. Sun says he wanted the feeling of “being swept along in a current of musical thought over a period of time." ...

4
Album Review

Kevin Sun: (Un)seaworthy

Read "(Un)seaworthy" reviewed by Jerome Wilson


Kevin Sun brings a fresh energy and and sense of adventure to the saxophone trio format on this CD. In the company of bassist Walter Stinson and drummer Matt Honor, he plays around with tone, rhythm and tempo, creating exciting music which blends the traditional and the experimental. Sun's sax tone on “Seaworthy (Unseaworthy)" is full and melodic, as he circles, stutters and flows eccentrically, constantly moving as Stinson and Honor maintain a steady groove. He barrels through ...

1
Album Review

Kevin Sun: The Sustain of Memory

Read "The Sustain of Memory" reviewed by Neri Pollastri


Il secondo album da leader del trentenne sassofonista e clarinettista newyorchese Kevin Sun è un'opera lunga, due CD, e complessa, articolata su tre suite diverse per organico e clima. La prima suite—"The Middle of Tension," in sei parti per un totale di trentasei minuti—vede di scena un classico quartetto, nel quale Sun è accompagnato dal pianoforte di Dana Saul, dal contrabbasso di Walter Stinton e dalla batteria di Matt Honor. Ed è il pianoforte, con la frammentarietà e ...

2
Album Review

Jacob Garchik: Clear Line

Read "Clear Line" reviewed by Dan Bilawsky


As strange as it may sound, sometimes the best way to break free is to simply box yourself in. Limitations obviously cut off certain possibilities entirely, but they open the mind to so many others in the process. Composer (and trombonist) Jacob Garchik has long subscribed to that line of thinking and he takes it to bold heights on this, the most original, least derivative big band recording to arrive in ages. Basically throwing out the rule ...

7
Album Review

Kevin Sun: (Un)seaworthy

Read "(Un)seaworthy" reviewed by Troy Dostert


Although he's a relative newcomer to the jazz world, having released his debut album, Trio (Endectomorph Music) in 2018, tenor saxophonist Kevin Sun is well on his way toward staking a major claim as a distinctive composer and soloist. After an excellent two-disc effort, The Sustain of Memory (Endectomorph) in 2019, he's now adding to his burgeoning discography with another trio album, (Un)seaworthy, featuring his regular associates, bassist Walter Stinson and drummer Matt Honor. With a formidable compositional apparatus but ...

7
Album Review

Kevin Sun: The Sustain of Memory

Read "The Sustain of Memory" reviewed by Dan McClenaghan


Ambition is good. Saxophonist Kevin Sun has it. He proves it by releasing--before attaining his thirtieth birthday--The Sustain of Memory, a cinematic two-disc set of atmospheric avant-garde music in trio, quartet and quintet settings, which maintains a start-to-finish focus of an expansive artistic vision. “I've always been drawn to sprawling, encyclopedic or maximalist works of art," Sun says. And he has produced an excellent and beautiful example of the genre. The music is divided into three “suites": the ...

1
Album Review

Kevin Sun: The Sustain of Memory

Read "The Sustain of Memory" reviewed by Jerome Wilson


This is an ambitious set of compositions by saxophonist Kevin Sun, 2 CDs which contain three suites for various-sized small groups, each with its own distinct identity. “The Middle Of Tensions" is in six sections played by a quartet of Sun, pianist Dana Saul, bassist Walter Stinson and drummer Matt Honor. Most of this work explores the contrasts between Sun's blasts of singing tenor and Saul's stumbling keyboard progressions, as the bass and drums keep a bumpy rhythm ...

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Primary Instrument

Saxophone, tenor

Location

Boston

Willing to teach

Intermediate to advanced

Credentials/Background

Pedagogical interests include basics of saxophone technique (sound production, articulation, inflection, posture, etc.), idiomatic jazz improvisation (swing, bebop, "post-bop"), and other technical aspects of the contemporary jazz mainstream. Emphasis on transcribing, study of source material, and fundamentals of idiomatic collaborative musicmaking. Also, willing to talk about more flashy stuff, e.g., hexatonic scales, chord substitutions and path-making, intervallic constructions, and other conceptual material. $60/hr, lessons in Boston, MA.

Photos

Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

The Depth of Memory

Endectomorph Records
2023

buy

The Depths of Memory

Endectomorph Music
2023

buy

<3 Bird

Endectomorph Music
2021

buy

(Un)seaworthy

Endectomorph Music
2020

buy

Clear Line

Yestereve Records
2020

buy

The Sustain of Memory

Endectomorph Music
2019

buy

Frozen in Profile

From: The Depths of Memory
By Kevin Sun

Greenlit

From: <3 Bird
By Kevin Sun

The Middle of Tensions I

From: The Sustain of Memory
By Kevin Sun

Find Your Pose

From: 'Trio'
By Kevin Sun

Videos

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