CURATION
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from this page:
by Augmented Matrix
Network Node
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Name:
Bob Reynolds
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City/Place:
Los Angeles, California
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Country:
United States
Life & Work
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Bio:
Bob Reynolds is an American jazz tenor saxophonist and Grammy Award-winning member of the band Snarky Puppy. Widely known for his work with both Snarky and John Mayer, he is a prolific composer and recording artist with 9 top-selling solo albums to his credit. The New York Times called him “a self-assured saxophonist and an unassuming yet effective composer.” An independent recording artist, Bob’s albums showcase his melodic improvisational style, tuneful songwriting, and, as the LA Times put it: “hip-swiveling” grooves. His 2013 album Somewhere In Between, a seamless blend of jazz, blues, rock and pop, reached #1 on iTunes’ jazz charts, and in 2017 he released the albums Guitar Band and Hindsight, both of which landed in the top ten on the Billboard Jazz charts. His latest release, Quartet, features his working band and debuted at #3 on Billboard’s Contemporary Jazz chart. They recently completed their first tour to sold-out audiences across Europe.
Born in Morristown, New Jersey in 1977, Reynolds grew up in Jacksonville, Florida, where he started playing saxophone at age 13. Although he listened to a range of music as a kid, by his late teens he was a dedicated jazz student. After high school he honed his skills at Boston’s Berklee College of Music, where he mentored with George Garzone, Hal Crook, and others. Bob is a passionate educator and in-demand clinician. He co-founded an annual retreat for saxophonists and, through his Virtual Studio, he helps musicians become confident improvisers. Bob lives in Los Angeles and shares insights on balancing a music career with raising a family through his popular YouTube vlog.
It's a rare saxophonist who's as comfortable in an arena full of rock fans as in an intimate jazz club. Bob Reynolds is a rare saxophonist.
Reynolds spent years touring the world in John Mayer's band, winning new fans with his solos on crowd favorites like “Vultures,” “Wheel,” “Gravity” and “Covered in Rain.” Watch his performances on YouTube and you'll see hundreds of accolades from admiring fans—not a normal occurrence for a saxophonist in a rock band. Reynolds' partnership with Mayer reminds many of Sting's collaborations with Branford Marsalis in the 1980s. Both he and Mayer are big fans of that band.
Reynolds has recorded and performed with everyone from Usher, Josh Groban and the Jonas Brothers to Amos Lee, Willie Nelson and Nellie McKay. He calls himself a "melody architect" and refuses to be boxed in by conventional genre labels. A child of the 80s, Reynolds' music is a blend of his early influences (Sting, Bruce Hornsby, Tears for Fears), R&B and soul (Michael Jackson, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder), and jazz (Stan Getz, Joshua Redman, Chris Potter).
At the same time as he's been touring the world to packed stadiums and playing with A-list superstars, Reynolds has stayed true to his jazz roots with performances in clubs across the U.S. Three of his five albums were recorded live with a who's who of the jazz and rock worlds, including keyboardist Aaron Goldberg, guitarist Mike Moreno, bassist Reuben Rogers, and drummer Keith Carlock, who's toured with both Sting and Mayer. Reynolds' records reflect his affinity for the jazz tradition at the same time as they display his skill with pop music. He makes the music he wants without compromise.
For Reynolds, music is about communication with the listeners. One of his album titles, Somewhere in Between, suggests his ability to cross genres. The album features jazz heavyweights Eric Harland on drums and Aaron Parks on piano, along with keyboardist Oli Rockberger of Mister Barrington and, on two tracks, John Mayer. It's a seamless and fearless blend of jazz, blues, rock and pop.
Inventive. Unconventional. An instantly recognizable player with his own musical vision who still finds a way to fit in no matter what the situation. As a leader or a band member, Reynolds is focused on melody, connection, and emotion.
Bob Reynolds is a rare saxophonist.
Contact Information
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Management/Booking:
Booking – US
Gunter Schroder
Music Works International
Phone: +1 781-300-7580
[email protected]
Booking – Europe
Bella Concerts
Otterkringerstrasse 132/1
1160 Vienna
Austria
+43 1 9974253
[email protected]
UID: ATU68957006
More
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Quotes, Notes & Etc.
“A self-assured saxophonist and an unassuming yet effective composer…”
NEW YORK TIMES
"...Reynolds flexes an assured hand with melding hip-swiveling jazz and funk as a bandleader."
LA TIMES
“Some of the freshest, most compelling, and most soulful music I have heard recently. Bob Reynolds is an amazing musician, with something very exciting and original to say.”
Joshua Redman, Grammy-nominated saxophonist
“Bob is one hell of a saxophonist! His sound is rich and his execution is effortless.”
Michael Brecker, Grammy-winning saxophonist
Clips (more may be added)
We use the mathematics of the small world phenomenon to transform the creative universe into a creative village wherein all are connected by short pathways to all... (Wolfram explains how above)
This Integrated Global Creative Economy uncoils from a sprawling Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazic, Arabic, European, Asian cultural matrix...
Great culture is great power.
"Thanks, this is a brilliant idea!!"
—Alicia Svigals (NEW YORK CITY): Apotheosis of klezmer violinists
"Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix."
—Susan Rogers (BOSTON): Director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory ... Former personal recording engineer for Prince; "Purple Rain", "Sign o' the Times", "Around the World in a Day"
"Dear Sparrow, Many thanks for this – I am touched!"
—Julian Lloyd Webber (LONDON): Premier cellist in UK; brother of Andrew (Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cats, Phantom of the Opera...)
"This is super impressive work ! Congratulations ! Thanks for including me :)))"
—Clarice Assad (RIO DE JANEIRO/CHICAGO): Pianist and composer with works performed by Yo Yo Ma and orchestras around the world
"We appreciate you including Kamasi in the matrix, Sparrow."
—Banch Abegaze (LOS ANGELES): manager, Kamasi Washington
"Thanks! It looks great!....I didn't write 'Cantaloupe Island' though...Herbie Hancock did! Great Page though, well done! best, Randy"
Our Matrix was conceived under a Spiritus Mundi ranging from the quilombos and senzalas of Cachoeira and Santo Amaro to Havana and the provinces of Cuba to the wards of New Orleans to the South Side of Chicago to the sidewalks of Harlem to the townships of South Africa to the villages of Ireland to the Roma camps of France and Belgium to the Vienna of Beethoven to the shtetls of Eastern Europe...*
Sodré
*...in conversation with Raymundo Sodré, who summed up the irony in this sequence by opining for the ages: "Where there's misery, there's music!" Hence A Massa, anthem for the trod-upon folk of Brazil, which blasted from every radio between the Amazon and Brazil's industrial south until...
And hence a platform whereupon all creators tend to accessible proximity to all other creators, irrespective of degree of fame, location, or the censor.
Matrix Ground Zero is the Recôncavo, bewitching and bewitched, contouring the resplendent Bay of All Saints (end of clip below, before credits), absolute center of terrestrial gravity for the disembarkation of enslaved human beings (and for the sublimity these people created), the bay presided over by Brazil's ineffable Black Rome (where Bule Bule is seated below, around the corner from where we built this matrix as an extension of our record shop).
Assis Valente's (of Santo Amaro, Bahia) "Brasil Pandeiro" filmed by Betão Aguiar
Betão Aguiar
("Black Rome" is an appellation per Caetano, via Mãe Aninha of Ilê Axé Opô Afonjá.)
Replete with Brazilian greatness, but we listened to Miles Davis and Jimmy Cliff in there too; visitors are David Dye & Kim Junod for NPR/WXPN
I opened the shop in Salvador, Bahia in 2005 in order to create an outlet to the wider world for magnificent Brazilian musicians.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar found us (he's a huge jazz fan), David Byrne, Oscar Castro-Neves... Spike Lee walked past the place while I was sitting on the stoop across the street drinking beer and listening to samba from the speaker in the window...
But we weren't exactly easy for the world-at-large to get to. So in order to extend the place's ethos I transformed the site associated with it into a network wherein Brazilian musicians I knew would recommend other Brazilian musicians, who would recommend others...
And as I anticipated, the chalky hand of God-as-mathematician intervened: In human society — per the small-world phenomenon — most of the billions of us on earth are within some 6 or fewer degrees of each other. Likewise, within a network of interlinked artists as I've described above, most of these artists will in the same manner be at most a handful of steps away from each other.
So then, all that's necessary to put the Brazilians within possible purview of the wide wide world is to include them among a wide wide range of artists around that world.
If, for example, Quincy Jones is inside the matrix, then anybody on his page — whether they be accessing from a campus in L.A., a pub in Dublin, a shebeen in Cape Town, a tent in Mongolia — will be close, transitable steps away from Raymundo Sodré, even if they know nothing of Brazil and are unaware that Sodré sings/dances upon this planet. Sodré, having been knocked from the perch of fame and ground into anonymity by Brazil's dictatorship, has now the alternative of access to the world-at-large via recourse to the vast potential of network theory.
...to the degree that other artists et al — writers, researchers, filmmakers, painters, choreographers...everywhere — do also. Artificial intelligence not required. Real intelligence, yes.
The deep roots of this project are in Manhattan, where Allen Klein (managed the Beatles and The Rolling Stones) called me about royalties for the estate of Sam Cooke... where Jerry Ragovoy (co-wrote Time is On My Side, sung by the Stones; Piece of My Heart, Janis Joplin of course; and Pata Pata, sung by the great Miriam Makeba) called me looking for unpaid royalties... where I did contract and licensing for Carlinhos Brown's participation on Bahia Black with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock...
...where I rescued unpaid royalties for Aretha Franklin (from Atlantic Records), Barbra Streisand (from CBS Records), Led Zeppelin, Mongo Santamaria, Gilberto Gil, Astrud Gilberto, Airto Moreira, Jim Hall, Wah Wah Watson (Melvin Ragin), Ray Barretto, Philip Glass, Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd for his interest in Bob Marley compositions, Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam and others...
...where I worked with Earl "Speedo" Carroll of the Cadillacs (who went from doo-wopping as a kid on Harlem streetcorners to top of the charts to working as a janitor at P.S. 87 in Manhattan without ever losing what it was that made him special in the first place), and with Jake and Zeke Carey of The Flamingos (I Only Have Eyes for You)... stuff like that.
Yeah this is Bob's first record contract, made with Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd of Studio One and co-signed by his aunt because he was under 21. I took it to Black Rock to argue with CBS' lawyers about the royalties they didn't want to pay (they paid).
Matrix founding creators are behind "one of 10 of the best (radios) around the world", per The Guardian.
Salvador is our base. If you plan to visit Bahia, there are some things you should probably know and you should first visit:
www.salvadorbahiabrazil.comAcross the creative universe... For another list, reload page.
This list is random, and incomplete. Reload the page for another list.
Wolfram MathWorld
Ex Terra Brasilis
Alicia Svigals
Susan Rogers
Julian Lloyd Webber
Clarice Assad
Kamasi Washington
Randy Brecker
Roberto Mendes
Luciano Calazans
Gustavo Caribé
J Velloso
Lázaro Ramos
Fernando Guerreiro
Maria Marighella
Russell Okung
Bule Bule
Caetano Veloso
RÁDIO MATRIX