Tell Me by Russ Nolan

Dear Listener,
Though this is anything but a dance record, most of the music was inspired by dancing the last five years in the New York Salsa scene. Eddie Torres, the scene’s legendary innovator, once told me I ‘was one of the only musicians he knew who could get the music from his fingers down to his toes.’ It was only natural to take what I learned in the dance and apply it back to my music. These compositions are some of my first ‘steps’ in the Latin Jazz world.
Writing a tune and instructing the rhythm section to ‘just play it Latin’ is similar to telling a world-class chef to simply ‘make me a meal’. Many details had to be fleshed out.
My seven Latin-influenced compositions have references to some of my favorite composers and their works. For example, both No Secrets (a Brazilian Baião in 2/4 time) and View from the Bridge (a Bolero in 10/8), are based on Jaco Pastorius’s classic, ‘Three Views to a Secret’. Tell Me is based on a combination of Herbie Hancock’s harmony on ‘Tell Me a Bedtime Story’ and the form based on Pastorius’s ‘Havona’ from his Weather Report tenure.
A study of Hancock’s re-harmonization of Stevie Wonder’s ‘I Just Called to Say I Love You’ had a profound effect on me writing Beyond Arbitrary (Afro-Cuban 6/8) and the 12/8 undercurrent of Creepin’ (also Stevie Wonder) was influenced by one of renowned drummer Ignacio Berroa’s grooves on his Codes recording (one of my favorite Latin Jazz compositional study albums). Oliver Nelson’s classic, Stolen Moments is also treated as an Afro-Cuban 6/8 undercurrent. Although not a strict or traditional Salsa composition, Joe Zawinul’s, A Remark You Made gave me a vehicle to treat a ballad with some sabor (flavor)!
Finally, the two non-Latin-influenced arrangements of Man in the Mirror (performed by Michael Jackson; straight eighths, 7/4) and Nowhere Man (John Lennon) were written for the dear members of my faithful following in NYC. Although most of them are not musicians, they wanted to hear their favorite music in a new way. As every bandleader knows, it is vital to develop an audience beyond one’s peers. I find an honest comment from a non-peer about the overall effect of my music infinitely more helpful and inspirational than the redundant and often obligatory ‘Ya, Man’ or ‘Sounds great, Man’.
Thank you for the opportunity to share my love and excitement for music with you.

Consistently voted onto DownBeat magazine’s Rising Star Annual Critics Poll, NYC Touring Jazz Saxophonist Russ Nolan’s music is often described as High-Energy Modern Jazz that both satisfies the intellect of its musical peers and speaks to everyone on a soulful level. His 2016 release of Sanctuary from the Ordinary-Live@ Firehouse 12 was voted onto DownBeat’s Best of 2016.

russnolan.com