Gloria Estefan Sings The Standards
Gloria Estefan Sings The Standards. (PRNewsFoto/Sony Masterworks)
New Recording Available From Sony Masterworks on September 10, 2013
NEW YORK, April 30, 2013 /PRNewswire/ – Sony Masterworks releases Gloria Estefan ‘s The Standards on September 10, 2013. Celebrating great tunes from the American Songbook, The Standards reaches out to Estefan’s global fan base via international song classics sung in English, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and French, some with new lyrics written by Estefan herself. The album also features collaborations with world class, award-winning artists like singer songwriter Laura Pausini, violinist Joshua Bell and saxophonist Dave Koz .
The ambitious project has been “on my back burner for a long time,” according to Estefan, who broached the repertoire on Frank Sinatra’s 1993 Duets album (on which she sang “Come Rain Or Come Shine” with Sinatra) and most recently on Tony Bennett’s Viva Duets (“Who Can I Turn To [When Nobody Needs Me]“). “I grew up listening to Frank Sinatra, Johnny Mathis, Henry Mancini and great romance recording artists in Mexico and Cuba,” says Havana-born Estefan. “This genre is right up my alley, since music is always a catharsis to me.”
Estefan waited until now to do a standards album to get “enough life under my belt,” she says, “since there are so many torch songs requiring life experience to deliver them with proper credibility.” The concept really took off at a trustee dinner at the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music, where Shelly Berg, who has produced and arranged for artists including Patti Austin, Elliot Smith and Arturo Sandoval, serves as dean.
“We sat at the piano just for fun and he asked me to sing a song I performed 30 years ago during our first appearance on the Carson Show,” says Estefan, recalling her Tonight Show performance of “Conga,” her 1983 breakthrough hit with Miami Sound Machine. It was during this session that she also sang “Good Morning Heartache,” the Billie Holiday classic that is now featured on The Standards.
“This album brings everything full circle for me!” she says, adding that the tracks were all chosen “by my heart and what I feel.” She brought a list of 50 standards to Berg that “spoke to me personally and made me cry.” She ended up recording 16 songs live in the studio with a core of four incredibly talented musicians, all maestros of this genre and a wonderful orchestra.
“Something magical happens when musicians record together live,” she explains. “Everything unfolded in the way it should have – the stars aligned!”
Throughout the recording process, Estefan went for “a sexy, romantic and intimate feel” she says. “I wanted to do an album without an extraneous note, with an economy of music so it would feel really intimate and it would be just enough to express the emotion of the song.”
Estefan also tried to approach these standards with fresh ideas. “On ‘They Can’t Take That Away From Me,’ for instance, we did it in a completely different way from what anybody’s done before, kind of a 6/8, almost Afro-Cuban feel meets the waltz,” she says.
For Antonio Carlos Jobim’s Brazilian classic “Eu Sei Que Vou Te Amar,” Estefan composed English lyrics for the first-ever English version, “It’s You I’ll Always Love,” and composed Spanish lyrics for “Eu Sei Que Voy Te Amar.” She also recorded it in French (“Tu Sais Je Vais T’Aimer”), having studied that language in school. She also composed Spanish lyrics for Charlie Chaplin’s “Smile,” on which she duets with Laura Pausini in both Spanish & Italian.
“This song always made me cry,” she says. “Charlie Chaplin spent his life making people smile and laugh and it’s one of the songs that breaks your heart. Recording it was daunting because Michael Jackson did a phenomenal version and so did Natalie Cole. There are so many versions. I wanted to bring my own sensitivity to it because it’s been so special to me, and Laura Pausini is amazing.”
Argentinean idol Carlos Gardel’s “El Dia Que Me Quieras,” for which Estefan wrote the first-ever English translation (“The Day You Say You Love Me”), has a very special significance. “It was the wedding song that Emilio and I danced to!” she relates. “I wanted to record it. It was never done in English, and I wanted it to be as close to the author as possible and I was so inspired. Before we started doing the record, I wrote the translation. It’s always nice when you can write a standard!”
Sony Masterworks comprises Masterworks Broadway, Masterworks, Okeh, Portrait, RCA Red Seal and Sony Classical imprints. For email updates and information please visit www.SonyMasterworks.com.
Track Listing
- Good Morning Heartache
- They Can’t Take That Away From Me
- What A Difference A Day Makes
- I’ve Grown Accustomed To His Face
- Eu Sei Que Vou Te Amar
- The Day You Say You Love Me Feat. Joshua Bell
- Embraceable You
- What A Wonderful World
- How Long Has This Been Going On Feat. Dave Koz
- Sonrie (Smile) Feat. Laura Pausini
- The Way You Look Tonight Feat. Dave Koz
- You Made Me Love You
- Young At Heart
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SOURCE Sony Masterworks
Web Site: http://www.SonyMasterworks.com
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Categories: Entertainment Tags: Dave Koz, Frank Sinatra, Gloria Estefan, Henry Mancini, Johnny Mathis, Joshua Bell, Laura Pausini, Sony Masterwords, The Standards, Tony Bennett
Smithsonian Celebrates Global Reach of Jazz during Jazz Appreciation Month
National Museum of American History Adds Artifacts from Jazz Greats Weston and Hernandez
Donation Ceremony: 10:30 a.m. April 9, Open to Media
WASHINGTON, April 9, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ – The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History will mark the 12th annual Jazz Appreciation Month with a global cultural perspective April 9, receiving jazz artifacts from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Jazz Master Randy Weston and Latin Jazz drummer Horacio “El Negro” Hernandez. A financial gift from the Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation will establish the first endowment fund to support JAM, a month-long celebration advancing appreciation of jazz as America’s original music.
Weston, a jazz pianist, composer and bandleader, is best known for his cultural exploration over five decades of jazz’s links to African roots and rhythms. He will donate the African attire he wore in 2011 when honored by King Mohammed VI of Morocco for bringing the country’s Gnaoua music traditions to the western world. Cuban-born Hernandez will give a purple drum kit with a special cowbell designed by him for drummers who play Latin rhythms, which represents his “fusion” style.
This year’s JAM 2013 programs include free performances by Weston and Hernandez as well as talks, tours and family-oriented events in venues around Washington, D.C., under the theme “The Spirit and Rhythms of Jazz.” Highlights include the April 9 “Latin Jazz Jam!,” co-presented with the George Washington University, that includes a concert with Hernandez and Giovanni Hidalgo and Weston’s April 10 “Nubian Suite” concert with music and historical narrative from his jazz opus. NEA Jazz Master Candido Camero will be the featured guest performer with Weston’s African Rhythms in the museum’s Warner Bros. Theater with a first-come, first-accommodated seating policy.
On April 26, jazz artist and composer John Clayton will join the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra in a tribute to NEA Jazz Master John Levy, a bassist who gained acclaim beginning in the 1940s for his business savvy as the country’s first African American jazz business manager. His clients ranged from British pianist George Shearing to jazz vocalist Nancy Wilson.
A full schedule of events at the Smithsonian is available online as well as links to resources and oral histories and more at http://smithsonianjazz.org/. As part of its educational mission, more than 100,000 posters featuring Lionel Hampton have been distributed to schools, organizations and government agencies in the U.S. and abroad through the Department of Education, the U.S. State Department and other collaborators. April 30 is International Jazz Day, which will be marked by an international event in Istanbul, co-sponsored by UNESCO and the Thelonius Monk Institute of Jazz.
The lead sponsor for JAM 2013 is the Argus Fund. Additional funding is provided by BMI, the Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation and the National Park Service. The museum launched JAM in 2001 as an annual event that pays tribute to jazz both as a historic and living American art form. It has since grown to include celebrations in all 50 states and 40 other countries. In celebrating JAM, the museum joins with a diverse group of organizations, institutions, corporations, associations and federal agencies that have provided financial and in-kind support, as well as organizing programs and outreach of their own.
The Smithsonian operates the world’s most comprehensive set of jazz programs and the National Museum of American History is home to jazz collections that include 100,000 pages of Duke Ellington’s unpublished music and such objects as Ella Fitzgerald’s famous red dress, Dizzy Gillespie’s angled trumpet, John Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme” manuscript and Benny Goodman’s clarinet. A number of jazz treasures, including Gillespie’s trumpet, Tony Bennett’s oil painting of Fitzgerald and Herbie Hancock’s cordless keyboard are on display on the second floor. To contribute to the JAM Endowment, contact the Office of External Affairs at 202-633-4334 or [email protected].
The Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra was founded in 1990 with an appropriation from the U.S. Congress in recognition of the importance of jazz in American culture and its status as a national treasure. The 17-member big band, led by conductor and artistic director Charlie Young, serves as the orchestra-in-residence at the National Museum of American History. Its concerts include transcribed works, as well as new arrangements, commissioned works and programs that illuminate the contributions of small ensembles and jazz masters who contributed to the development of American jazz and defined the music’s character. Tickets are required for SJMO performances. More information about the SJMO is available at www.sjmo.org.
The National Museum of American History is located at 14th Street and Constitution Avenue N.W., and is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. (closed Dec. 25). Admission is free. For more information, visit http://americanhistory.si.edu.
SOURCE Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History
Web Site: http://www.americanhistory.si.edu
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Categories: Entertainment Tags: bandleader, Benny Goodman, composer, Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, fusion, George Shearing, Herbie Hancock, Horacio "El Negro" Hernandez, JAM, Jazz, Jazz Appreciation Month, John Clayton, John Coltrane, John Levy, Latin Jazz Jam!, Lionel Hampton, Music, Nancy Wilson, National Park Service, Pianist, Randy Weston, Smithsonian, The National Museum of American History, The Spirit and Rhythms of Jazz, Thelonius Monk, Tony Bennett
Gloria Estefan Reunites With Sony Music Entertainment
Miss Little Havana (2011), kept her momentum going strong with the #1 dance club hits “Hotel Nacional” and “Wepa.”
One of The Most Successful and Influential Global Recording Artists Returns to Her Longtime Home
MIAMI, April 3, 2013 /PRNewswire/ – Sony Music Entertainment is proud to announce the return of international superstar Gloria Estefan to her longtime label home.
The globally renowned seven-time Grammy award winning singer, songwriter and actress is resuming her incredibly successful, time-tested alliance with Sony Music via a multi-album agreement to develop a diverse array of new projects.
Gloria Estefan has achieved worldwide sales of over 100 million units over the course of her legendary career, and 38 #1 hits across the Billboard charts. Her iconic hits, which include “Conga,” “Turn The Beat Around,” “Get On Your Feet” and Spanish-language chart-toppers “Con Los Anos Que Me Quedan” and “Mi Tierra,” have made an indelible impression on generations of music fans. She also has received countless achievements; including her Oscar nominated song “Music of My Heart,” a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and an American Music Award for Lifetime Achievement. Much of her storied music career has been spent as a Sony Music recording artist, beginning with her years leading Miami Sound Machine.
Welcoming Gloria back to Sony Music, Afo Verde, Chairman and CEO of Sony Music Entertainment for the Latin Region, Spain and Portugal, said, “It only takes one word to recognize her magnificent voice. Gloria is one-of-a-kind – in any language, in any genre. She sings better every day! Dearest Gloria, welcome to the place that always was and always will be your home, Sony Music. We are honored, happy and thank you for your trust. The best is yet to come!”
Gloria Estefan expressed her enthusiasm about the alliance and announced her new project: “I’m excited to join again with Sony, who I have happily worked with for over 30 years,“ she said. “ The Standards , a project which has been a lifelong dream, will be the first of many more to come with my Sony family.“
The expansive, multilingual project The Standards is produced by Gloria herself. She personally selected songs with a deep connection to her life. These include American standards “The Way You Look Tonight” and “Good Morning Heartache,” which she performed at her very first Tonight Show appearance in 1985 with Miami Sound Machine. She also wrote “The Day You Say You Love Me,” a moving English version of the Carlos Gardel tango classic “El Dia Que Me Quieras,” the only translation ever authorized by his estate. This gem is dear to her heart as it was her wedding song. The Standards is co-produced by Grammy Award-winning pianist, producer and arranger Shelly Berg, and Gloria’s husband, 19-time Grammy Award winner Emilio Estefan.
Gloria Estefan is already acclaimed for her skill at delightfully reinventing timeless songs – her RIAA Double Platinum album Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me (1994) featured remakes from the 1950s-1970s. Now, with The Standards , she interprets these gorgeous classic songs in English, Spanish, Italian, French and Portuguese, and invites world-renowned collaborators including Dave Koz, Joshua Bell and Laura Pausini, The Standards , scheduled for a fall release, furthers Gloria Estefan’s reputation as an interpreter par excellence.
A Gloria Estefan album is an event because she always gives us more than we expect – musically, visually and artistically. Her previous album, Miss Little Havana (2011), kept her momentum going strong with the #1 dance club hits “Hotel Nacional” and “Wepa.” Furthermore, with “Hotel Nacional,” Gloria also became the first female artist to debut a song at #1 on Billboard‘s Hot Latin Songs chart. Most recently, she performed with Tony Bennett on his Top 10 Viva Duets album.
Bogdan Roscic , President of Sony Classical and Sony Masterworks said, “Masterworks is thrilled to be a marketing partner with Sony Latin and Gloria Estefan on this very special project. It represents another landmark in the career of an artist who continues to be a creative inspiration in all styles of popular music.”
Nir Seroussi, Managing Director of Sony Music U.S. Latin said, “We’re very excited that Gloria – one of the greatest ambassadors of Latin music – has returned to Sony, her home, with an extraordinary album that will surely be embraced by her millions of fans.”
With more projects on the way to dazzle and delight her fans, the legendary Gloria Estefan will continue opening doors around the world as a premier artist of the Sony Music Entertainment family.
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SOURCE Sony Music Entertainment
This company’s web site http://www.sonymusic.com
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Categories: Entertainment Tags: Actress, Conga, Dave Koz, Emilio Estefan, Get On Your Feet, Gloria Estefan, Good Morning Heartache, Joshua Bell, Laura Pausini, Miami Sound Machine, Miss Little Havana, Music of My Heart, Shelly Berg, Singer, songwriter, Sony Music Entertainment, The Day You Say You Love Me, The Standards, The Way You Look Tonight, Tony Bennett, Turn The Beat Around, Viva Duets
RPM/Columbia/Legacy Recordings Set To Release Bennett & Brubeck – The White House Sessions, Live 1962, An Historic One-Time Musical Summit Of Two American Jazz Masters
Newly Discovered Historic Live Jazz Summit – Tony Bennett & Dave Brubeck – The White House Sessions, Live 1962 – Available May 28. (PRNewsFoto/RPM/Columbia Records/Legacy Recordings)
Recently Discovered Master Tapes From Sony Music Entertainment Vaults Reveal Impromptu Genius in The White House Seminar Program American Jazz Program
Lost Jazz Treasure Available for the First Time Ever on Tuesday, May 28
Bennett & Brubeck – The White House Sessions, Live 1962 will be available Tuesday, May 28.
One of the great lost treasures of American musical history, the Tony Bennett-Dave Brubeck White House Seminar performance came about when the artists–each already on the bill with his own ensemble–agreed to seize the moment with an impromptu set. While the Bennett-Brubeck recording of “That Old Black Magic” had surfaced on the occasional compilation (Brubeck’s 1971′s out-of-print LP, Summit Sessions, and 2001′s Vocal Encounters), the rest of the Bennett and Brubeck performances–an hour’s worth of music–were a mythical lost object in the Sony Music Entertainment vaults until finally surfacing through a fortuitous discovery last December, just weeks after Brubeck’s passing on December 5, 2012 (one day shy of his 92nd birthday).
1962 was a pivotal time in American cultural and musical history and for the artists on this recording. Just seventeen days before the White House Seminar American Jazz Concert, Tony Bennett had entered the Billboard charts with his signature song, “I Left My Heart In San Francisco,” and there is an ebullience in Tony’s performances and a palpable excitement of the college-age audience in their recognition of Tony’s on-fire success. Dave Brubeck’s “Take Five” had become emblematic of jazz itself and, in 1962, Brubeck’s band was picked as the best combo in jazz by Down Beat magazine readers and DJs surveyed by Billboard.
With both Bennett and Brubeck at the top of their respective games, the masters play off and with each other to create a spontaneous collaborative music that stands with the best of each of their work.
It would be 47 years before Tony Bennett and Dave Brubeck would share a stage again to make music when they both appeared at the Newport Jazz Festival in 2009 and performed “That Old Black Magic,” one of the standards they’d immortalized in Washington in August 1962.
In his liner notes to the album, noted jazz historian Ted Gioia observes, “Both had arrived at stardom, but were seemingly stars from different galaxies.
“Yet these two beloved musicians also had much in common. Both had served in World War II, and participated in the Battle of the Bulge. Both were active in the Civil Rights Movement—not long before this recording was made, Brubeck canceled 23 concerts rather than replace his African-American bassist Eugene Wright, and Bennett would soon be marching with Martin Luther King in Montgomery, Alabama. But these two artists were musically simpatico as well. They shared a devotion to the great American songbook, and knew how to straddle the worlds of jazz and popular music without compromises or crass commercialism, yet still reach millions of people, many of whom would never step inside a jazz club or read a copy of Down Beat.
“So what a blessing to have these tracks from the past, a true meeting of musical masters, come to us more than half-century after they were made, but still sounding as fresh and alive as they did to those present back in 1962. The concert that day was held to honor college students who had come to Washington D.C. to work for the summer—in fact, they had met earlier that day with President Kennedy. Historians often use the phrase ‘the best and the brightest’ to refer to the smart, idealistic people who gravitated to government service in those years, but I would apply those same words to the artists on stage that day. And after hiding out in a dark archive for so many decades, the music of two of the best and brightest to ever interpret the American popular song is shining for us once more.”
Bennett & Brubeck
The White House Sessions, Live 1962
1. Introduction – William B. Williams
2. Take Five
3. Band introduction
4. Nomad
5. Thank You (Dziekuje)
6. Castilian Blues
The Dave Brubeck Quartet
Dave Brubeck, piano; Paul Desmond, alto sax;
Eugene Wright, bass; Joe Morello, drums
7. Introduction – William B. Williams
8. Just In Time (from Bells Are Ringing)
9. Small World (from Gypsy)
10. Make Someone Happy (from Do Re Mi)
11. Rags To Riches
12. One For My Baby (And One More For The Road) (from the RKO film, The Sky’s The Limit)
13. (I Left My Heart In) San Francisco
Tony Bennett
with Ralph Sharon, piano; Hal Gaylord, bass;
and Billy Exner, drums
14. Lullaby Of Broadway (from the Warner Bros./Vitaphone film, Golddiggers Of 1935)
15. Chicago (That Toddlin’ Town)
16. That Old Black Magic
17. There Will Never Be Another You (from the 20th Century-Fox film, Iceland)
Tony Bennett
with The Dave Brubeck Trio
Dave Brubeck, piano;
Eugene Wright, bass; Joe Morello, drums
Produced by Teo Macero
SOURCE RPM/Columbia Records/Legacy Recordings
Web Site: http://legacyrecordings.com
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Categories: Entertainment Tags: Billboard, Columbia Records, Dave Brubeck, Down Beat, I Left My Heart In San Francisco, Jazz, Legacy Recordings, Sony Music Entertainment, Summit Sessions, Take Five, Tapes, That Old Black Magic, Tony Bennett, Vocal Encounters, White House Seminar American Jazz Concert
