the Why at Lilypad

We are a chamber-jazz quartet that features piano, bass, the cellist Catherine Bent. But more significantly for me, the band replaces the normal drum chair of a traditional jazz trio with a hand percussionist who plays frame drum, tambourine, and cajon. These sounds are much quieter and more transparent than a drummer’s sticks ringing on a cymbal, and they allow us to play without any amplification, entering the natural world of chamber music dynamics.

The music is conceived to include significant amounts of improvisation, both song form and free-form. In that way it is related to jazz. The compositions, which I wrote mostly while on fellowship at the MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire, are crafted around melodies and harmonic progressions that I hope always maintain their connection to the voice and to the heart. ...

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We are a chamber-jazz quartet that features piano, bass, the cellist Catherine Bent. But more significantly for me, the band replaces the normal drum chair of a traditional jazz trio with a hand percussionist who plays frame drum, tambourine, and cajon. These sounds are much quieter and more transparent than a drummer’s sticks ringing on a cymbal, and they allow us to play without any amplification, entering the natural world of chamber music dynamics.

The music is conceived to include significant amounts of improvisation, both song form and free-form. In that way it is related to jazz. The compositions, which I wrote mostly while on fellowship at the MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire, are crafted around melodies and harmonic progressions that I hope always maintain their connection to the voice and to the heart.

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