Tuesday, April 12, 2016, 7:30 p.m.
Hudson Hall, Rogers Music Center
DOWNBEAT, USA/Shaun Brady
Theo Bleckmann Ben Monder Duo - At Night
**** (4stars)
“...so virtuosic and inventive a pair...the two share a subtle discipline that results in a focused, cohesive whole....For all its layered density, the album is about nothing so much as atmosphere. At Night is the intimate sound of being alone inside one’s own head.
Bleckmann’s keening vocals flow over Monder’s cascading steel-string arpeggios, like a waterfall’s constant roar full of smaller ripples and eddies....
A jazz singer and new music composer of eclectic tastes and prodigious gifts, GRAMMY® NOMINATED Theo Bleckmann makes music that is accessibly sophisticated, unsentimentally emotional, and seriously playful. His work provokes the mind to wonder, but connects immediately with the heart.
Bleckmann maintains an ongoing creative relationship with guitar phenomenon Ben Monder, generating a series of performances and a pair of albums that wreak beautiful havoc with standard expectations of jazz and rock.