NEW YORK — Trumpeter/composer Michael Sarian is an artist who paints images of humanity through sound. On “New Aurora,” his fourth album as a leader, we find him on trumpet and flugelhorn as the sole melodic voice in this acoustic quartet, a clear departure from his previous releases which feature extensive four-horn arrangements, electronics and hard-hitting grooves (Sarian has released three albums as a bandleader with his septet, Michael Sarian & The Chabones, and also leads Michael Sarian & The Big Chabones, a 16-piece big band).
The album, released on September 4 on Ears&Eyes Records, features Sarian (trumpet, flugelhorn, compositions); Santiago Leibson (piano); Marty Kenney (bass) Matt Pavolka (bass) and Dayeon Seok (drums).
Listening closely through flesh, metal, breath and spit we can hear his family’s heritage, his musical heroes and his declaration as a jazz artist who has something compelling and beautiful to add to the conversation.
Born in Toronto and raised in Buenos Aires from the age of 1, Sarian has been calling New York City home for the past eight years. “New Aurora” has been in gestation since Sarian’s first release in 2014, and the album comes to us as a result of engineer/producer Luis Bacque’s downright insistence that the trumpeter venture into a freer, more acoustic setting that would feature his own playing, particularly on the flugelhorn, at the forefront of the ensemble’s sound (Sarian plays flugelhorn on all tracks save the first).
Inspired by the music of trumpet greats Kenny Wheeler, Tomasz Stanko, Enrico Rava, and legendary Armenian/American drummer Paul Motian, Sarian ventured into Bacque’s studio to test the waters of this new musical direction. After an afternoon spent at the New Jersey recording studio with Santiago Leibson (piano), Matt Pavolka (bass) and Dayeon Seok (drums), the session yielded the first two tracks of what would become “New Aurora.”
Sarian began writing the first of the compositions, This Is Only The Beginning, in a hotel room in Florida during the first days of 2019, while reading Japanese writer Haruki Murakami’s Killing Commendatore. The novel tells the story of a 30-something artist facing an early onset mid-life crisis, who, after a devastating separation, decides to quit his lucrative career as a portrait painter, retreat into the mountains and pursue a more fulfilling path of abstract self-expression, proclaiming “this is only the beginning.”
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Drawing on his own family’s heritage in Armenia and Eastern Europe, Mountains deals with the landscapes his ancestors had to navigate, from historical Armenia in Eastern Turkey, to Istanbul, to Romania during and after the genocide, all the way to Argentina, Canada, and back to Argentina, for him to finally find his current home in New York City. A nod to his family name (sar means mountain in Armenian, and Sarian translates to son of the mountain), the track has three layers working together: a drum groove in 5 based loosely on Armenian rhythms, the bass and piano playing a static two beat back and forth, and a floating melody on the flugelhorn.
Sarian introduced a new piece the evening before the first December session, titled The Morning After. It starts out with a Beatles-esque piano motif, and conveys the frantic despair one might have after a big night out, which as fun as it might be, many times comes with self-doubt the next morning, giving in to the briefest of existential crisis. The shortest track in the album, the tune breaks down into a completely free improvisation between the four musicians, only to be brought back into the melody before an abrupt finish.
Colorado Yeta is the only recycled tune of the album, which Sarian recorded with his septet and released on his previous recording. Literally translated into Spanish (or Argentine slang), it means Bad Luck Ginger, and expresses the sorrows of growing up as a redhead in Argentina.
The last track on the album is, Monk’s Ask Me Now, presented here as a lovely duet with Sarian and pianist Leibson, serving as a sort of palate cleanser after almost an hour of original compositions and arrangements.
Michael Sarian is a trumpeter and composer whose work has been described as “a steady study in dichotomy. With a wordless elegance, the New York City-based musician is flexibly firm, loosely tight, and brightly dark. The innovations within his compositions are deceptively dramatic with varying degrees of a melodic sensibility.” – Frank De Blasé, The rochester City Newspaper.
He relocated to New York City in 2012 to pursue a master’s degree in Jazz Studies at New York University, where he studied with great musicians such as Laurie Frink, Alan Ferber, Brad Shepik, Ralph Alessi and Mike Rodriguez. He has since performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival, BRIC JazzFest, Getxo Blues Festival, Canary Island International Jazz Festival, Blue Note Jazz Club, Jazz at Lincoln Center, The Beacon Theater, Central Park SummerStage, Teatro Colón, Thelonious Club, has appeared on WNYC’s Soundcheck with John Schaefer, NPR’s World Cafe, and many more.
Michael has released three albums as a bandleader with his septet, Michael Sarian & The Chabones, most recently LEÓN in 2018 with Zoho Music, and has appeared on countless more as a sideman. Sarian is a faculty member at TrumpetLand.com and a Remic Microphones endorser.
Besides performing regularly with his own projects and as a sideman throughout New York City, Sarian teaches trumpet, theory and composition.
To listen to Sarian’s music or purchase the CD, visit www.MichaelSarian.com or www.EarsandEyesRecords.com