Ralph Alessi & This Against That

Ralph Alessi, trumpet/composer
Tony Malaby, tenor saxophone
Andy Milne, piano
Drew Gress, bass
Mark Ferber, drums

February 4, 2009
8:30 p.m.
Wednesday
Bucknell Hall – Free

RALPH ALESSI has been active on the New York jazz and improvised music scene as both sideman and leader since 1991. Described as an “adventurous virtuoso who can handle just about anything” by L.A.Weekly, he has performed and recorded with Steve Coleman, Uri Caine, Don Byron, Ravi Coltrane, Sam Rivers, Drew Gress, Fred Hersch and many other great innovators. In addition to extensive credits as a sideman, Alessi has multiple CDs under his own name, including Hissy Fit, Vice Virtue, Look, and This Against That, the latter voted a Jazz Times top ten recording. He will release two new recordings soon, including a quartet project featuring Blue Note pianist Jason Moran. Alessi describes his compositions as an “organic – toeing the line between jazz, pop and contemporary classical music”. His quintet has toured Europe and the United States over the past four years playing major cities including Rome, Paris, London, Amsterdam, Milan, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Oakland. As an educator, he has been a member of the faculties at Five Towns College and the Eastman School of Music. Since 2002, he has been on the jazz faculty at New York University and recently founded the influential School for Improvisational Music (www.schoolforimprov.org), a non-profit entity holding improvisational music workshops.

TONY MALABY, a native of Tucson, Arizona, has been permanently based in New York since 1995. He has been a member of many notable jazz groups including Charlie Haden’s Liberation Orchestra, Paul Motian’s Electric Bebop Band,Mark Helias’s Open Loose, Fred Hersch’s quintet, theWaltWhitman project, Michell Portal’s Birdwatcher, Daniel Humair, and bands led by Mario Pavone, Tim Berne, Chris Lightcap, Kris Davis, Angelica Sanchez, Michael Attias, and Marty Ehrlich. His debut as a leader for Arabesque, Sabino, made the New York Times and Philadelphia City Paper’s top ten jazz lists. Since then, Malaby has released Tamarindo, Adobe, Apparitions, and Alive in Brooklyn, Vols. 1 and 2.

ANDY MILNE, a Toronto native, moved to New York in 1991 to become a member of Steve Coleman & Five Elements for the next six years. Coleman’s M-BASE associates, CassandraWilson and Greg Osby, also invited Milne to perform with their groups which led to recording and touring with Ravi Coltrane, Ralph Alessi, CarlosWard, and Grammy-nominated vocalist Carla Cook, among many others. Milne was recently awarded the 2007 French-America Jazz Exchange Commission and voted “Rising Star Keyboardist” by Down Beat Magazine. He currently serves as a faculty member of The School for Improvisational Music and The New School for Social Research in New York City.

DREW GRESS, a veteran of over 100 recordings, is the first-call bassist for cutting edge contemporary improvised music by artists ranging from the pianists Fred Hersch, Bill Carrothers, and Simon Nabatov, to woodwind specialists Tim Berne, Don Byron, Ravi Coltrane, and the collective Joint Venture. In a previous musical life, he grounded the performances of Buddy Hackett, Phyllis Diller, Zoot Sims, Cab Calloway, and Pia Zadora. His harmonically gifted and lyrical compositions are featured on his recordings, including Irrational Numbers; 7 Black Butterflies; Spin & Drift; and Heyday.

MARK FERBER attended the University of California in Los Angeles where he earned a B.A. in Geography while studying classical percussion with Mitchell Peters and drum set with Billy Higgins. In Los Angeles, he performed with Bob Sheppard, AnthonyWilson, Billy Childs, Bud Shank, and the Los Angeles Jazz Quartet. A fractional list of performance credits in New York includes work with Lee Konitz, Norah Jones, Fred Hersch, and Larry Goldings.