JASON ROBINSON
Saxophonist, Flutist, Composer
NEXT CONCERT:
1 April 2025
Green Street Quintet, Northampton Jazz Workshop
City Sports Grille, Spare Time Bowling | Northampton, MA
2024 IN REVIEW
What an incredible year! I began the year in January as a composition fellow at Yaddo in Saratoga Springs, NY, and finished the year in December in NYC, performing and recording the phenomenal music of composer David Sanford with the Ecce Ensemble. In between included another composition fellowship at MacDowell (August); a tour with longtime friends and new collaborators in France, Czechia, and Hungary (July); a US Northeast tour with my Janus Ensemble (October); the release of my 19th and 20th albums, Ancestral Numbers I (May) and Ancestral Numbers II (October); the release of a special dub single--Ancestral Dubbers--a collaboration with dear friend and longtime musical associate Marcus Urani (June), including a full-length music video created by yours truly; the surprise release of the limited edition handmade Ancestral Numbers I/II box set, a rare collectors item for the discerning fan (October); performances of my new music for big band by the New England Jazz Collaborative in Boston, MA; and much more. It was a busy year!
As I pivot to 2025, I hold close to my heart my time this past year at Yaddo and MacDowell, those incredible sanctuaries for creativity and artistic fellowship. I was deeply moved by the work and dedication of my fellow artists, and I found great inspiration to advance my upcoming large ensemble composition project BLUE SALIENCE: FOR YUSEF LATEEF closer to completion. More news about this soon!
My final thoughts in the waning hours of 2024 are of gratitude. I'm deeply thankful for the opportunities I've had this past year to work with many inspiring folks, some of whom are listed here. THANK YOU! --- Michael Dessen, Scott Walton, Marcus Urani, Joshua White, Drew Gress, Ches Smith, John Hébert, Ann Braithwaite, Michael Musillami, Charlie Kohlhase, Christopher Robin Cox, Marcelo Radulovich, Victoria Henry, Glenn Siegel, Priscilla Page, everyone with Pioneer Valley Jazz Shares, Mark Redmond, everyone at Firehouse 12, Clay Fink, David Sanford, John Aylward and everyone with the ECCE Ensemble, Jeremy Cohen and everyone with the New England Jazz Collaborative (NEJC), Anastassia Petrova, Jacob William, Zoe Murphy, Richie Barshay, everyone with Creative Music Gathering (CMG), Allan Chase, George Schuller, Mathew Muller, Anna Wetzel, Ian Behrstock, and the many other collaborators and friends that are too many to list here. Thank you!
About Jason Robinson
The music of American composer, saxophonist, flutist, and scholar Jason Robinson ("rugged and scintillating," New York Times) thrives in the fertile overlaps between improvisation and composition, acoustic music and electronics, tradition and experimentalism. Initially a devotee of post-1960s jazz and creative music, Robinson is celebrated for bringing together various historical directions in jazz--bebop, post-bop, the avant-garde--with an improvisatory and compositional sensibility drawn from and extending the languages of John Coltrane, Albert Ayler, Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus, and Lester Young. His musical interests, however, span far and wide. Born in 1975, he is a critically acclaimed distinctive voice in a generation of creative musicians in equal dialogue with jazz, popular music, experimental music, and electronic music.