Derek Bermel: Migration Series, Mar de setembro & A Shout, a Whisper, and a Trace

Featuring

David Alan Miller
Derek Bermel
Ted Nash
Luciana Souza
Juilliard Jazz Orchestra
Albany Symphony Orchestra

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Composer's Artistic Vision

Composer Derek Bermel describes his musical thinking as a mosaic, using motifs that reappear across movements to create different patterns from the same source material.

Compositional Technique

Derek Bermel, a clarinetist, states that his music tends toward the lyrical and contrapuntal, and that Thelonious Monk is likely the biggest harmonic influence on his work.

Composition History

The work "Migration Series" was commissioned by Wynton Marsalis, head of Jazz at Lincoln Center, to combine the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra and the American Composers Orchestra.

Composer Biography

Derek Bermel, the composer, studied with notable American composers William Bolcom and William Albright, and also traveled to study diverse musical traditions like Thracian folk music and Lobi xylophone playing from Ghana.

Historical Context

The piece "A Shout, a Whisper, and a Trace" honors Béla Bartók, a composer who lived his last five years in New York and struggled with illness and adjusting to life there.

Performer Biography

Luciana Souza, the vocalist on this album, is a GRAMMY® Award-winner and a leading jazz singer born in São Paulo, Brazil, into a family of bossa nova innovators.