Pro Musica Musical Evenings Presents Lord / Stein / Sugimoto / Tate / Rumback!!

Musical Evenings is excited to invite to hear this Allstar Quintet!!
Debut of new quintet material composed by David Lord.
Ken Christianson, Pro Musica Chicago

David Lord Guitars
Jason Stein Bass Clarinet
Mai Sugimoto Saxophones
John Tate Acoustic Bass
Charles Rumback Drums

Doors Open at 7pm
Concert at 8pm
Artist donations requested, all proceeds go directly to Artists
BYOB

Using aleatoric applications of his Extended Lydian Polychordal harmonic framework, David Lord has crafted his own approach to chordal voicings, composition, improvisation, and harmony. Grounded in the natural world, Lord's musical logic involved themes of the forest, fungi, and ecosystems. Critic Bill Milkowski writes, “David Lord is a six-string anomaly, a genuine diamond in the rough. Over time in his search and discovery missions with his chosen instrument, he has cultivated a wholly unique vocabulary that is devoid of any direct influences. What the guitarist presents is so delightfully weird and wonderful, so refreshingly original that it stands as his own personal manifesto for an alternative six-string expression.” From 2018-2024 Lord released four volumes of his Forest Standards series featuring contributions from Chad Taylor, Jeff Parker, Billy Mohler, Devra Hoff, Christine Tavolacci, David Tranchina, Nathan Hubbard and others. All four albums were recorded at BIG EGO Studios in Long Beach, CA and released via BIG EGO Records & Astral Spirits. In his Pro Musica debut, Lord presents a body of work titled “Spore Print Purple”, composed for a quintet of bass clarinet, alto saxophone, guitar, double bass and drums.

Jason Stein is among the mere handful of improvisers who play the bass clarinet exclusively. Stein leads the acclaimed trio Locksmith Isidore as well as his own quartet. He contributes to several of the leading bands on Chicago’s new-music scene and has brought a vital voice to the freest of free-jazz jams. Stein’s playing showcases an extraordinary expertise on the bass clarinet, which ranges from powerful post-bop lines to ear-grabbing wails in the altissimo range. Stein moved to Chicago in 2005 and has since recorded for such labels as Leo, Delmark, Not Two, Atavistic, 482 Music, Clean Feed, Astral Spirits, and Northern Spy. Stein has performed throughout the US and Europe as both a bandleader and sideman and has amassed a discography of over 40 albums.

Mai Sugimoto is a saxophonist, composer, educator, and active member of Chicago's jazz and creative music scene. Born/Raised, her debut album (Asian Improv Records, 2018), explores this cultural and musical binary, juxtaposing her Japanese upbringing with the American jazz idiom. Sugimoto is a core member of the quartet Hanami, whose two albums similarly mix Japanese culture into creative music. Sugimoto has performed five times at the Chicago Jazz Festival: in 2015 with Hanami, in 2019, 2022, and 2024 as a leader, and in 2018 and 2022 with renowned bassist Tatsu Aoki, with whom she frequently plays, including appearances in his Fred Anderson Legacy Band. Her first solo album, monologue (Asian Improv Records) was released in March of 2021. Sugimoto’s work also appears on Natural Information Society’s album, Since Time Is Gravity (Eremite, 2023). Of her latest album, Sunlight filtering Through Leaves (Asian Improv Records, 2024), music critic Peter Margasak writes that “[the album] conveys that singular joy of good improvised music, when it’s not about ripping solos but group unity. Naturally, I’m advising you all to pay close attention to Sugimoto from here on out.”
John Tate: A first-call accompanist in Chicago, John Tate has played with any number of important artists including Matt Wilson, Marquis Hill, Ron Miles, Von and George Freeman, Ben Monder, Jeff Parker, John Chin, Sacha Perry, Bill Carrothers, Victor Goines, Caroline Davis and Billy Kaye. He also performs and records with experimental drummer-composer Charles Rumback, appearing on the 2015 duo album Daylight Savings and the 2017 trio efforts Threes and Tag Book.
As those musicians will attest, the downstate Illinois native has lived up to his primary aim of "making who I'm playing with sound better." He prizes bassist's Israel Crosby's playing in the legendary Ahmad Jamal Trio: "He never took the listener’s attention away from Ahmad’s solo and his solid rhythmic feel was infectious."
At the same time, carrying forth lessons learned at the Juilliard School from the great bassist and NEA Jazz Master Ron Carter, he strives to avoid predictable solutions. "When I first heard Ron on Miles Davis' classic album E.S.P., I didn't understand what he was doing," he says. "I had never heard a bass played like that, the unpredictability of his lines, the understated power, those moving harmonies and rhythms and the way he influenced the solos of his bandmates. After that, I wasn't interested in predictable approaches."
John studied with Earl Gately, a distinguished bassist/pedagogue and professor at Knox College in Galesburg, and Andy Crawford, another Knox professor who now co-heads the school's jazz program. As if he needed more convincing that jazz was his future, a visit to Galesburg by renowned drummer/bandleader Matt Wilson, a native of nearby Knoxville, clinched the deal with a memorable master class for the high school jazz program.
Charles Rumback performs in many varied and disparate musical settings from deep inside the jazz tradition to the periphery of its outer rings on his third album Threes. Rumback always maintains his characteristic sound and personal language, from the blurry fringes of rock to backing the most plaintive singer-songwriters, with a musical voice that is instantly recognizable. In 2016, Rumback created an album that made good on its title’s promise of new beginnings with his acclaimed quintet album, In The New Year. The album was well received, earning him a spot on "best of" year-end polls and on the stage of the Von Freeman Pavilion at the 38th Annual Chicago Jazz Festival flanked by trumpet luminary Ron Miles and saxophone greats Tony Malaby and Greg Ward. Now, with his resolutions kept and another Chicago winter in the rearview, Rumback finds himself removing layers, and musicians, to reveal the sparse, yet verdant nature of his working trio with his rhythmic foil John Tate on bass, and the elegant, inquisitive piano of Jim Baker. Captured live from a concert at one of Chicago’s most creative venues for new music, Constellation, Threes is a 21st century update on the classic piano trio. The album comes out swinging with the Rumback’s composition, ”Salt Lines.” An upbeat opening salvo, and the first of three originals on the recording, “Salt Lines” states a hopeful, albeit bittersweet, melody; one that takes its time to resolve, leaving more questions than answers. The push and pull of free gravity is felt strongest on the album’s centerpiece composite of "Three Story Birdhouse / Right Reasons.” There is plenty of room for the trio to kinetically move together and disrupt one another, with Baker and Tate tangling their lines in knots only to untie them, open them up, and reveal a constellation of notes tracing out nameless, mythic figures. “Erato” opens slowly to reveal the trio’s wide open harmonic palette and, in particular, Jim Baker’s dynamic and unique pianism. Rumback’s choice to include an Andrew Hill composition reads like a statement of intent, as if to say, "Here’s where we’re coming from." Although he’s Kansas born and raised, Rumback has long called Chicago home. Covering a Chicago native makes complete sense. But, where is it going? The albums book end, “Too Toney” is where. The song is a fine example of the drummer’s compositional knack towards the patient and reflective with a gravitational pull into the free; a dark, impressionistic waltz that takes form as if it is still in the darkroom, developing before the listener’s ears, just to shape shift again, out of reach.