Storied Aardvark Jazz Orchestra To Release New CD, Passages, April 16, MIT Kresge Auditorium

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - April 2, 2016 - PRLog -- Called "stunningly beautiful and adventurous" (New York City Jazz Record), the Aardvark Jazz Orchestra celebrates the release of the band's 14^th CD, Passages (Leo Records), featuring works by director Mark Harvey, April 16 at 8 pm, MIT Kresge Auditorium, 77 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA. Free admission. Information:  617-776-8778.

The CD has garnered rave reviews in Europe.  Jazz Podium (Germany) wrote, "Aardvark Jazz Orchestra proves once more its reputation as one of the best jazz ensembles in the world," while Jazz Views (UK) praised the "highly imaginative and varied music which is marvelously suggestive of its themes….The Aardvark Jazz Orchestra play beautifully all the way through the album.  It speaks an extraordinary dialectic, harmonious though bizarrely ruminating.  Exceptional music indeed."

In the April 16 show, Aardvark will perform the centerpiece of the new CD, Commemoration (Boston 2013), a tribute to the victims and survivors of the Boston Marathon tragedy.  In addition, Harvey will present Dreaming (2014) and No Walls (2004), and premieres of his latest works Fluctuations and By the Way.

Founded in 1973, Aardvark is one of the longest running large jazz ensembles in the world.  Michael Ullman wrote in ArtsFuse (October 2015), "Led by trumpeter-composer Mark Harvey, Boston's own Aardvark Jazz Orchestra is something of a miracle as well as a consistent joy…. it is has been performing brilliantly evocative, varied original music with a steady core of personnel for 43 years."  http://www.aardvarkjazz.com

With Passages, the Aardvark Jazz Orchestra presents its latest CD of live performance recordings, the 14^th disc in its catalogue.  The selections, all by Mark Harvey, conjure up sonic images ranging from frenetic to lyrical, turbulent to elegiac, and monumental to meditative.  The four compositions on the CD are described below:

Spaceways is inspired by and dedicated to Sun Ra, a major influence on the band for many decades.

Saxophrenia was commissioned by the MIT Festival Jazz Ensemble and premiered in 2002 at MIT as a saxophone sextet featuring master musician Joe Lovano.  The big band arrangement heard on the CD quickly followed.

Twilight is collectively improvised from a graphic score and displays the nuanced subtleties of the improvisational ensemble.

The final composition, Commemoration (Boston 2013), is a suite paying homage to the victims and survivors of the terrorist attack on the Boston Marathon and the subsequent assassination of an MIT police officer.  Krystal Campbell, Lingzi Lu, Martin Richard, and Officer Sean Collier were all murdered in this event that traumatized Boston and beyond.  Harvey writes, "Commemoration reminds us of the fragility of life and evokes emotions experienced by survivors, first-responders, and the community alike.  The music follows the passage from shock to anger to grief to an elegy for the departed.  Unity in sound offers strength in a search for transcendence and healing."

The tradition of creating music expressing a social consciousness is a significant one in jazz, ranging from Ellington to the Art Ensemble of Chicago and Charlie Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra. Charles Mingus's Fables of Faubus is one powerful example, expressing the pathos associated with the integration of the Little Rock, Arkansas public schools during the civil rights struggle.

Mark Harvey has established his own niche within this tradition, having composed and recorded numerous works in this vein.  Among them are Tiananmen Elegy, Heartsong (for Burmese Nobel Peace Prize recipient Daw Aung Sun Suu Kyi), No Walls (for Doctors Without Borders), Blood on theSun/New Moon Rising (a response to the tragedy of 9/11), Sumner (a commemoration of Harvey's ancestor, abolitionist and statesman Charles Sumner), and The Journey (the historical journey toward school desegregation in Boston).

The Aardvark Jazz Orchestra performs original compositions by Mark Harvey, as well as classics from the jazz tradition, American music, and world music.  Aardvark has premiered more than 175 works.  Guest artists have included luminaries Geri Allen, Jaki Byard, Dominique Eade, Jimmy Giuffre, Vinny Golia, Robert Honeysucker, Sheila Jordan, Rajesh Mehta, Lewis Porter, Matt Savage, and Walter Thompson.  The band has been praised for "exuberance, imagination and sheer brio" (Jazz Review, UK) and called "captivating" (Jazz Improv) and "spellbinding" (The Boston Globe), while JazzTimes wrote, "Aardvark suggests the best and the brashest of Charles Mingus, Gil Evans, George Russell, and even Frank Zappa."

Aardvark is: Arni Cheatham, Peter H. Bloom, Phil Scarff, Chris Rakowski, Dan Zupan/saxes and woodwinds; K.C. Dunbar, Jeanne Snodgrass/trumpets; Bob Pilkington, Jay Keyser/trombones; Jeff Marsanskis, Bill Lowe/bass trombones, tuba; Richard Nelson/guitar; John Funkhouser/string bass; Rob Bethel, cello; Hollis Headrick/drums; Jerry Edwards and Grace Hughes, vocalists; Mark Harvey/trumpet, music director.

Mark Harvey has performed in major venues including Fenway Park and Symphony Hall, Boston, the Knitting Factory and the Village Gate (NYC), the National Gallery of Art (DC), the Berlin Jazz Festival (Germany), and the Baja State Theater (Mexico).  His credits include recordings with George Russell's Living Time Orchestra (Blue Note) and Baird Hersey & the Year of the Ear (Arista/Novus), and appearances with Gil Evans, Howard McGhee, Sam Rivers, and Claudio Roditi, among others.  Harvey has received commissions from the Meet the Composer/Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Commissioning Program, the 15^th Annual John Coltrane Memorial Concert, the MIT Sesquicentennial Celebration, and others.  In 2015, Harvey was named Boston Jazz Hero by the Jazz Journalists Association.  Dr. Harvey is a minister and an educator who teaches jazz studies at MIT.

The Aardvark Jazz Orchestra is managed by Americas Musicworks, Rebecca DeLamotte, Director, telephone 617-776-8778 or email delamotte-amw at comcast dot net  Visit http://www.americasmusicworks.com