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ALBUMS WITH DON BYRON AS LEADER
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For detailed track listings, personnel, and a sound sample, click on the album covers!
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See also this list of albums featuring Don Byron as a sideman
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Do The Boomerang DIn December 2005, Don Byron launched a new group dedicated to the music of soul legend, saxophonist and singer Junior Walker. Featuring Byron on tenor saxophone, Dean Bowman on vocals, guitarist David Gilmore, George Colligan on Hammond B-3 organ, bassist Brad Jones, and Rodney Holmes on drums, the group recently recorded a new album, Don's sixth for Blue Note Records. Singer/guitarist Chris Thomas King appears as special guest on several tracks. Entitled "Do The Boomerang," the new CD contains covers of several of Junior Walker's biggest hits, including "Shotgun," "Roadrunner," and "What does it take to win your Love," as well as a version of James Brown's "There It Is." Don Byron Plays Junior Walker will be touring in the US and Europe following the CD release on October 3, 2006. |
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A Ballad for Many (Cantaloupe, 2006) "The combination of polymath composer-clarinetist Don Byron and the six
post-minimalist virtuosos of the Bang on a Can All-Stars is a match made in
musical heaven, and this collection of Byron's short, illustrative pieces is
almost sinfully exciting. Most of the music is aggressively rhythmic but
with a whimsical undercurrent, a blend of impulses that winds up shooting
metallic sparks in all directions. "Eugene," a suite of jittery pieces
written for a 1961 television broadcast by Ernie Kovacs, is pugnacious,
sharp and always unpredictable like the Three Stooges if they were funny.
Other squibs are as cartoonish as their titles ("Fyodorovich," "Blinky
Blanky Blokoe"), but Byron also works a more traditional vein with the
soundtrack for the documentary "The Red-Tailed Angels." And for sheer beauty
there is "Basquiat," a luxuriant slow waltz that will make you melt.
(Rating "Excellent")"
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A Fine Line
Arias & Lieder (Blue Note, 1999) "Byron has consistently shown both his love and mastery of classical music, but bringing to it his own stylistic eclecticism, wry humor, and edgy social criticism. A Fine Line joyfully follows suit as he places high-art pieces next to Motown classics. It benefits heavily from brilliant arrangements and sublime clarinet playing, plus an array of guest vocalists that includes Cassandra Wilson and Mark Ledford." |
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Romance with the Unseen
Frisell | Gress | DeJohnette (Blue Note, 1999) "Featuring Byron in a quartet with guitarist Bill Frisell, drummer Jack DeJohnette, and bassist Drew Gress, 'Romance' is Byron's most 'inside' recording to date. It's sweet, gentle, and reflective with firm, willowy lines from Byron...There is also a sparseness that evokes longing." |
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Nu Blaxaploitation
Don Byron & Existential Dred (Blue Note, 1998) "The music is a range of tasts dominated by funk-flamed jazz, with forays into horn-driven Latin and the avant-garde that gives way to smart-alecky scripts...The approach is reminiscent of Frank Zappa's satirical extramusical excursions... He's made an all-too-rare record that's both provocative and fresh." |
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Bug Music
(Nonesuch, 1996) "Don Byron likes to use jazz reperatory to nudge compsers from the fringes into public consideration. His music often arrives in the form of an argument, and on 'Bug Music', he argues for the reputation of the swing band leaders John Kirby and Raymond Scott as underappreciated rebels and genre colliders with a distinct link to Duke Ellington." |
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Music for Six Musicians (Nonesuch, 1995)
“A brilliant clarinetist, Byron explores the nuances of Latin and Carribean styles through tunes that unfold with surgical precision. The emotional flavors of salsero Eddie Palmieri, merengue singer Juan Luis Guerra, and calypso star Mighty Sparrow waft through these hothouse arrangements…” |
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Don Byron Plays the Music of Mickey Katz
(Nonesuch, 1993) "Mr. Byron has used his arsenal of what he calls 'nerdy facts' to establish the importance of the once-dismissed schtickmeister, Mickey Katz. 'A lot of people thought that Mickey Katz couldn't play,' he said,, ' but there are things he played I couldn't even finger, so that can't be right.'" |
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performances | projects | biography | discography | music © 2002–2006 Don Byron
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