Saxophonist and composer Daniel Bennett tried to find his own way after the disruption of the New York City nightlife through the Covid-19 pandemic and his answer is summarized in this new album called ‘New York Nerve’.

During lockdown Daniel started to play on the rooftop of his apartment building and when restaurants and jazz-clubs opened again he performed with his band under “snow-covered heat lamps”. His idea was always to bring the music to the people and he found some comrades that shared his idea and followed him in the last 15 months. When studios re-opened in 2020 he recorded this album together with

•  Assaf Kehati: Electric Guitar
• Kevin Hailey: Electric Bass
• Koko Bermejo: Drums

The album starts with ‘Television’, a song that has a beautiful melody built on a steady rock-groove with the Bennett-typical change of tonal centers. The seamless transition from saxophone to clarinet together with the change of the background from guitar riffs to piano chords is done quite nicely.

‘The Town Supervisor’ moves much slower. Assaf Kehati on guitar trades solos with Daniel Bennett, interesting is how the groove is slightly modified and I think the long background notes are played by Daniel Bennett on clarinet.

‘Gold Star Mufflers’ is a song that Daniel recorded before but this new version sounds much cleaner and has a certain spirit of a merry-go-round in an (sometimes enchanted) amusement park. Excellent song and great arrangement.

The album continues with ‘Human Playback’. The melody is accompanied by arpeggios while the solo part reduces the harmonic elements significantly to a simple pattern. The short guitar solo is played without any harmonic support. The final melody returns again to the arpeggio accompaniment. The long coda of this song is dominated by a vanishing saxophone.

‘Rattlesnake’ begins as an open improvisation and changes to an steady nice sad melody which is repeated multiple times giving this song a contemplative character.

The album closes with ‘The County Clerk’. The solo part of this slow song starts with a duet between Daniel Bennett on saxophone and Assaf Kehati on guitar before each of them has its own solo part.  One final major chord and some cymbals swoosh and the album comes to and end.

‘New York Nerve’ is the right title for this album because it shows – with Daniel Bennett as its most passionate advocate – the courage and unfaltering spirit of this city to stay positive and creative. The songs are all typical Bennett-songs with beautiful melodies and strong modulations, the arrangements are done quite nicely and the band produces a compact and transparent sound on this album.

More information on the Daniel Bennett group is available on their website:
https://danielbennettgroup.com/

And finally the complete album as Spotify-playlist:

More than two years have passed since I presented an album of the Daniel Bennett Group. The group comes back this September not with mysteries or confusion but with pure music. “We Are The Orchestra” is the name of the latest album that has been released on September 7.

Daniel Bennett prefers to play in small ensembles, he goes on tour only with drums and guitar. For this album he reduced the number of musicians down to two.  He and Mark Cocheo recorded all of the wind, string and percussion instruments with the goal to create the sound of a large ensemble.

The line-up looks as follows:

• Daniel Bennett: Alto Sax, Tenor Sax, Flute, Piccolo, Clarinet, Oboe, Piano, Percussion
• Mark Cocheo: Electric Guitar, Banjo, Acoustic Guitar, Nylon-String Guitar

The collaboration between these two musicians started when Bennett arranged the musical score for “Whitman at the Whitney” at the Whitney Museum in New York City. The show featured Daniel Bennett on saxophone and Mark Cocheo on banjo playing famous opera excerpts from the 19th and 20th century.

The official promotion video explains that in detail:

The album contains eight songs with a total playtime of 29 minutes and features six originals by Daniel Bennett and two opera themes by 19th century composer Giuseppe Verdi.

The album starts with the song “Loose Fitting Spare Tire”, a typical Daniel Bennett composition that modulates heavily. The banjo and the western guitar define the folk sound of this tune. Solo instruments are an electric guitar and saxophone.

“I’m Not Nancy” follows this pattern, a catchy melody based on harmonies with multiple tonal centers. Flute and banjo are the solo instruments and the band sounds this time like a bluegrass combo.

The third song “Gold Star Mufflers” is another Daniel Bennett-original. The piano background gives this song it’s character and the minor chords moving in major thirds create that special “mystery” sound of this song.

The album continues with the “Theme From Ernani”, the first opera theme on this album. The pulse of the song comes from the banjo rhythm, Mark Cocheo plays a great guitar solo (I guess on his telecaster), the flute adds nice fills and someone had fun with the percussions especially with the vibra-slap.

We come to my personal favorite on the album. It’s a composition by Daniel Bennett again and is called “Refinancing For Elephants”. This song has a beautiful contemplative feeling, with the clarinet and the piccolo playing the melody and guitar and tambourin laying the background.

“Inside Our Pizza Oven” goes all the way to Marrakech, a song that reminds me of the atmosphere of the ‘Djemaa el Fna’-marketplace. Daniel plays the oboe and percussion and Mark adds a strumming guitar.

The next tune is the second composition by Guiseppe Verdi on the album. This title is called “Theme From Il Trovatore” and the Daniel Bennett Group interprets this waltz straight even a little bit cheesy, especially when two saxophones play the melody together at 1:30, but it fits perfectly for this song.

The album closes with “Carl Finds His Way”, again a typical Daniel Bennett-composition with moving tonal centers. Mark plays his guitar solo with a distortion effect, so this songs sounds much more like a pop song. Mark and Daniel again have a chance to show their virtuosity and the song ends with a dialog between guitar and saxophone.

The album is quite an eclectic collection of musical elements from folk, classic and jazz music and shows the versatility and the mastery of these two musicians. They have been able to create a full and well-balanced  sound. The Daniel Bennett Group has clearly found it’s style and the success of their unique musical approach proves them right.

More information about the Daniel Bennett Group can be found on their website:
https://danielbennettgroup.com

And finally a playlist on Spotify:

Well, another year has come and with it a new album from the Daniel Bennett Group. I’m watching the group’s activities since I did the review of the 2015 album “The Mystery at Clown Castle”.
The group was touring a lot during the last year and their setup is quite unique with Daniel Bennett typically on alto saxophone (but also on flute, clarinet and oboe), Nat Janoff on guitar and Matthew Feick on drums.
“I have always been obsessed with the idea of playing in *very* small-sized bands. I think it forces the musicians to give 110% to the music. It also encourages us to play and utilize many instruments and sounds. “, Daniel explained.

On the album the trio is supported by Eddy Khaimovich on bass (as on the last album).

The album has 10 songs and a total playtime of 36 minutes, so this is not a typical jazz album. But the band sees itself not as a typical jazz band, they describe their style as “quirky modern Jazz, fused with elements of Surf Rock and Avant-Pop”.

There are definitely some nice little pop songs on the CD, like the first tune “John Lizard Comes Home” or the title song of the CD “Sinking Houseboat Confusion” and my personal favorite “Animals Discussing Life Changes”.  These songs have a catchy melody and they tell us a little story like a good pop song should do.

But the Daniel Bennett group does not stop here, the CD is again a rather individual mix of styles, sounds and techniques.

Take “Little Disappointments of Modern Life” which is a contemporary piece of art where Daniel Bennett accompanies Michele Herman presenting her poem,
or “Bobby Brick Sent Me”, a hypnotic saxophone improvises over a steady guitar and drums rhythm.

Or listen to the “Sinking Houseboat Confusion (Acoustic Reprise)” with Mark Cocheo on guitar. The song starts with a long and  atmospheric dialog between guitar and alto saxophone and turns into a nice groovy acoustic version of the title song. This second part is another highlight for me on the CD.

The album is not officially released until June 25th but there are two videos where you can already hear two of the songs:

Behind the Scenes: Sinking Houseboat Confusion
(to listen to “John Lizard Comes Home”)

Official Music Video: Sinking Houseboat Confusion
(you hear “Sinking Houseboat Confusion”)

Stay tuned on the Daniel Bennett Group and if you’re able to listen to the whole CD (hopefully in two weeks) then Daniel’s promise is: “This music will shock some and hopefully delight ALL!”

Yes, Daniel, I was delighted. To use Michele Herman’s words:
I “…pound you on the back: Good job, good job”.

Here’s a new CD from the Daniel Bennett Group from New York, officially released on February 5. The setup of the band already makes clear that this is not another ordinary or traditional jazz band. Guitar, bass and drums together are  typically found in pop or rock bands and Daniel Bennett plays alto saxophone and all kinds of other woodwinds like oboe, clarinet and flute (Alto sax with guitar is also a perfect combination since they use a different frequency range and get the necessary space to shine). All songs on the album have been written by Daniel Bennett and his style and his taste are strongly influenced by classical saxophone literature (where he actually holds a master degree), minimalistic composers like Philip Glass and all those “little bits from here and little bits from there” influences you’ll pick up in the capital of jazz music.

The songs are quite structured, arranged and do not follow the standard schema of jazz standards. Improvisational parts are included but limited. That also means that a song on the CD lasts between 3 and 4 minutes.

The sound of the band is compact and distinct, Daniel Bennett’s alto saxophone sound is beautiful and the quality of the recording is excellent.

Let’s take a closer look at the songs on the CD:

The first three songs “The Clown Chemist”, “The Spinning Stood Still” and “Paul Platypus” are all played in the default line-up with Nat Janoff on guitar, Eddy Khaimovich on bass and Matthew Feick on drums.

“The Clown Chemist” already shows the ability of the band to play complex rhythm patterns with a shining saxophone flying over the grooving band, changing grooves and instruments, when Daniel Bennett picks up his flute playing like the Pied Piper of Hamelin bringing us all into his musical cosmos.

This journey continues with “The Spinning Stood Still” where guitar and bass get a chance to show their virtuosity as soloists.

The next song is, according to Daniel Bennett, the most popular song on the album. “Paul Platypus” was picked as “Jazz Track Of The Day” at All About Jazz (www.allaboutjazz.com). It has a catchy melody

But Daniel is not stopping here, continuing on the path he outlined. He jumps into something different: “Minor Leaguer” is a poem by Britt Melewski set to music with Britt himself reciting his words. A very unique acoustic art work.

The next two tunes “Nine Piglets” and “Strange Jim and the Zebra” are again very Daniel Bennett-ish. The title of the songs remind me about funny or mysterious stories from children books and the songs itself have a strong melody played in a very elegant and harmonic way.

Britt Melewski gets a second chance to present one of his poems. In “Morning” however the words are more shouted than spoken over a steady riff played by the band.

With “Inside the Outside Interlude” and the last song on the CD called “Outside the Inside Outro” we get to know another facet of this CD, the “Free Jazz” side of Daniel Bennett, featuring Jason Yeager on piano.

Jason Yeager gets his big moment in “Uncle Muskrat” which is the most down-to-earth title on this CD. This song is rather bluesy and straight played with a soft double bass and smooth percussion background. Very classy.

Daniel Bennett takes us on this CD on a journey to rather different shores. Songs like mysterious children stories, poems and free jazz music show the many facets of what Jazz is all about: Express yourself.

“The Mystery at Clown Castle”  is a true colorful piece of contemporary jazz and I would recommend that you to take some time and listen to the CD more than once to comprehend his music.

More information on tour dates of the Daniel Bennett Group are found on their website www.danielbennettgroup.com

Here is an interview with Daniel Bennett on NBC 12 – Florida with a live performance of “Paul Platypus”:
Daniel Bennett Group on First Coast Living (NBC 12 – Florida)

And finally a playlist on iTunes: