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REACH

Christian Sands

REACH

Price: € 19.95
Format: CD
Label: Mack Avenue
UPC: 0673203111721
Catnr: MAC 1117
Release date: 05 May 2017
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1 CD
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€ 19.95
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Label
Mack Avenue
UPC
0673203111721
Catalogue number
MAC 1117
Release date
05 May 2017

"Musician to keep an eye on"

Limburgs Dagblad, 21-8-2017
Album
Artist(s)
Composer(s)
Press
EN

About the album

With his debut Mack Avenue Records recording, REACH, singularly talented pianist and five-time Grammy® Award nominee Christian Sands is stretching into exciting progressive territory as he breaks new ground traversing from the straight-ahead zone into fresh-sounding music influenced by a range of styles, from Afro-Cuban rhythms to hip-hop beats to dirty blues with an edge. That's impressive for a youngster who is just 27. "The collection here is about reaching new ideas and reaching new music," he says. "I'm reaching from past recordings to bring in the future, which is really all about finding myself. It's a chance to express my experience."

Artist(s)

Christian Sands (piano)

Christian Sands grew up in New Haven, Connecticut, and later moved to the nearby Orange. He started playing the piano at a very young age, and took lessons from the age of four; he commented that 'I grew up with it in the house, in the classroom and on stage so it has always been a huge part of my life'. Sands was mentored by pianist Billy Taylor, who allowed the teenager to close one of the sets that Taylor played at the Kennedy Center. Sands went on to study at the Manhattan School of Music. The school's Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra, led by Bobby Sanabria, recorded the album Kenya Revisited Live in 2009; it was nominated for a Latin Grammy. After graduating, Sands joined Inside Straight, one of bassist Christian McBride's bands; they have toured...
more

Christian Sands grew up in New Haven, Connecticut, and later moved to the nearby Orange. He started playing the piano at a very young age, and took lessons from the age of four; he commented that "I grew up with it in the house, in the classroom and on stage so it has always been a huge part of my life".
Sands was mentored by pianist Billy Taylor, who allowed the teenager to close one of the sets that Taylor played at the Kennedy Center. Sands went on to study at the Manhattan School of Music. The school's Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra, led by Bobby Sanabria, recorded the album Kenya Revisited Live in 2009; it was nominated for a Latin Grammy.

After graduating, Sands joined Inside Straight, one of bassist Christian McBride's bands; they have toured internationally.

Sands became a Steinway artist in 2012. In 2014, Sands cited as influences McBride, Wynton Marsalis, Kenny Garrett, and Marcus Roberts, because "They're coming from the tradition of bringing people into the music, but also moving it forward into new directions". In the same year, Sands became an American Pianists Association Jazz Fellowship Awards Finalist.


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Christian McBride (bass)

In the 1960s, when the Civil Rights Movement achieved its greatest moments, gifted bassist and composer Christian McBride was not yet born. As a child in the 1970s, he learned the history of the movement in school, but due to a quirk of fate – his grandmother’s fortunate propensity for saving old things – he found another source of information that spoke to him on a more emotionally accessible level than history books. “When I was a kid, I used to spend hours looking at old copies of Ebony and Jet magazines that my grandmother saved,” he says. “To read contemporaneous writings by black writers about events and people who were my history – our history – that was absolutely fascinating...
more

In the 1960s, when the Civil Rights Movement achieved its greatest moments, gifted bassist and composer Christian McBride was not yet born. As a child in the 1970s, he learned the history of the movement in school, but due to a quirk of fate – his grandmother’s fortunate propensity for saving old things – he found another source of information that spoke to him on a more emotionally accessible level than history books.

“When I was a kid, I used to spend hours looking at old copies of Ebony and Jet magazines that my grandmother saved,” he says. “To read contemporaneous writings by black writers about events and people who were my history – our history – that was absolutely fascinating to me. It was the greatest gift my grandmother could have given to me.”

That gift played a major role in the creation of The Movement Revisited: A Musical Portrait of Four Icons, McBride’s stunning masterpiece about “the struggle,” which is now a 20 year-long, continuously evolving project. The work combines elements of jazz, gospel, big band, swing, symphony, theater and dramatic spoken word, in a clear-eyed yet optimistic look at where our society has come from and where it is hopefully headed.

Born in Philadelphia, McBride was a gifted musical prodigy who soaked up influences from every direction. At the tender age of 17, he was recruited by saxophonist Bobby Watson to join his group, Horizon. During the 1990s, he proceeded to work with some of the biggest names in jazz, including Pat Metheny, Wynton Marsalis, Freddie Hubbard and Chick Corea as well as major pop and rock stars like Sting, Paul McCartney, James Brown and Celine Dion. His abilities were also coveted by the classical music world, including opera legends Kathleen Battle and Renee Fleming.

In 1998, a musical commission from the Portland (Maine) Arts Society set in motion what would eventually become a major part of his life’s work. The only stipulation for the commission was that it had to include a choir. “At that time, I called it a musical portrait of the Civil Rights Movement,” Christian says. “I thought about those times and decided that rather than try to write a history of the movement, I wanted to evoke its spirit and feeling.”


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Marcus Strickland (saxophone)

Cristian Rivera (percussion)

Composer(s)

Christian Sands (piano)

Christian Sands grew up in New Haven, Connecticut, and later moved to the nearby Orange. He started playing the piano at a very young age, and took lessons from the age of four; he commented that 'I grew up with it in the house, in the classroom and on stage so it has always been a huge part of my life'. Sands was mentored by pianist Billy Taylor, who allowed the teenager to close one of the sets that Taylor played at the Kennedy Center. Sands went on to study at the Manhattan School of Music. The school's Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra, led by Bobby Sanabria, recorded the album Kenya Revisited Live in 2009; it was nominated for a Latin Grammy. After graduating, Sands joined Inside Straight, one of bassist Christian McBride's bands; they have toured...
more

Christian Sands grew up in New Haven, Connecticut, and later moved to the nearby Orange. He started playing the piano at a very young age, and took lessons from the age of four; he commented that "I grew up with it in the house, in the classroom and on stage so it has always been a huge part of my life".
Sands was mentored by pianist Billy Taylor, who allowed the teenager to close one of the sets that Taylor played at the Kennedy Center. Sands went on to study at the Manhattan School of Music. The school's Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra, led by Bobby Sanabria, recorded the album Kenya Revisited Live in 2009; it was nominated for a Latin Grammy.

After graduating, Sands joined Inside Straight, one of bassist Christian McBride's bands; they have toured internationally.

Sands became a Steinway artist in 2012. In 2014, Sands cited as influences McBride, Wynton Marsalis, Kenny Garrett, and Marcus Roberts, because "They're coming from the tradition of bringing people into the music, but also moving it forward into new directions". In the same year, Sands became an American Pianists Association Jazz Fellowship Awards Finalist.


less

Press

Musician to keep an eye on
Limburgs Dagblad, 21-8-2017

'Reach' closes with a beautiful ballad with piano trio, which flows into a jubilant climax. What an energy!
Jazzflits, 19-6-2017

His compositions are challenging and due to the high level of technical and musical play of this group, listening is a real pleasure.
Rootstime, 22-5-2017

Play album Play album
01.
Armando’s Song
05:11
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
02.
Song of the Rainbow People
06:20
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
03.
Pointing West
06:07
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
04.
Freefall
06:51
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
05.
¡Óyeme!
06:33
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
06.
Bud’s Tune
07:13
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
07.
Reaching for the Sun
07:10
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
08.
Use Me
07:27
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
09.
Gangstalude
06:01
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera
10.
Somewhere Out There
06:46
(Christian Sands) Christian Sands, Christian McBride, Marcus Baylor, Marcus Strickland, Gilad Hekselman, Yasushi Nakamura, Cristian Rivera

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