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6 Degrees Entertainment

Title - Samba Jazz Odyssey
Artist - Hendrik Meurkens The WDR Big Band

For those of you not in the know, maestro Hendrik Meurkens isn’t just an acclaimed artist, whom we have all come to admire. He’s a man brimming with incandescent ideas which manifest into musical gold.

Indeed, what makes Meurkens so special is the singularity of his sound - a German-born, New York-based harmonica player who performs Latin Jazz.

If there is a Venn diagram of these attributes, he would be one of the few in the middle. That he has carved such a niche over a storied career should put this album under a special light. Samba Jazz Odyssey is an adventure with seven pieces composed by Meurkens, which were undoubtedly informed by his trailblazing musical journeys around the world.

The maestro pairs with the august WDR Big Band, from Cologne, Germany, with arrangements which were also conducted by Michael Philip Mossman, a Grammy-nominated arranger.

This project is very special to me, said Meurkens. It is everybody’s dream to record with the WDR Big Band, and I was honored to collaborate with them.

The resulting production is a vivid voyage through samba jazz in its many forms.

1. A Night in Jakarta
2. Manhattan Samba
3. Prague in March
4. Sambatropolis
5. Mountain Drive
6. You Again
7. Bolero para Paquito
8. Samba Tonto
9. Choro

This brand new album A Night in Jakarta (out May 20th, 2022 via Zoho Music) isn’t just a get-up samba with feel good effect. It exemplifies the theme of this project, a veritable tour of samba jazz, which begins in the South Pacific.

Furthermore, Meurkens wrote the piece as an honorific for the Java Jazz Festival organizers based in Jakarta. He and his Samba Jazz Quartet have played at this well-regarded festival many times.

Meurkens has fond memories, particularly of the late-night jam sessions at the hotel. Paul Heller (tenor saxophone) and Raphael Klemm (trombone) deliver dazzling solos to get this album going.

Opening on the free flowing majesties within the title track itself A Night in Jakarta and then a track that Meurkens first recorded on his album Poema Brasileiro in 1996, Manhattan Samba, they back that up seamlessly with the laid back, late night ambiances of Prague in March, the upbeat, finger-snapping rhythms of Sambatropolis and then the euphorically charged Mountain Drive.

O an album where every tune is created with a multitude of melodically rhythmic layers and runs where the band plays as one, navigating the sections with aplomb, up next is the furtively magnificent You Again, the dining serenade of Bolero para Paquito, and then the album rounds out with the gentle hipsway of Samba Tonto, coming to a righteous close on the triumphantly soaring melodies within Jobim’s Choro.

This piece is a musical dedication to the vibrant samba jazz scene in New York, as many terrific Brazilian artists live in the Big Apple.

Official Website

Minas @ Facebook

www.ZohoMusic.com





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