John Boswell - Count Me In
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Track Listing
- Reunion 5:19
- Do It As a Friend 4:36
- The Promise of Rain 4:43
- Skye Boat Song 5:36
- Dance Beneath the Moon 4:32
- Aletha 3:26
- Underwater Scene 4:07
- One Night in Paris 5:41
- Fourteenth Street 5:13
- Heart Away from Home 3:32
- Four A.M. 4:54
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After two successful solo piano records (The Painter and Kindred Spirits, both on Scarlet) and an exceptionally well-received Hearts of Space Christmas album, JOHN BOSWELL was ready for a take-no-prisoners statement that would propel his recording career to the next level. Count Me In is it. Work began in the summer of '92 on JOHN BOSWELL's Count Me In, with concept and repertoire discussions with versatile producer BRIAN KEANE, the man behind the board for Festival of the Heart, the Christmas project. The plan was to work toward a radiophonic NAC/contemporary instrumental sound, while never losing touch with the warm, uncomplicated, appealing piano style that's endeared Boswell to his ever-expanding audience. The result ranges between lyrical folk harmonies and jazz, with Boswell's basic commitment to unselfconscious emotional communication.
Producer Keane attracted an impressive group of instrumentalists to the project, beginning with his own considerable contributions on guitars, synths, and percussion programming. Underrated saxophonist DAVE MANN achieves effortless perfection on alto and soprano throughout, and MARION MEADOWS blows sweet soprano sax on one tune. DAVE ANDERSON slides 'n glides his distinctive fretless bass sound on three tunes, and VICTOR BAILEY plays electric bass on one. Hot young ethnic percussionist ARTO TUNCBOYACIYAN, along with JIM MOLA and JARY MALL complete the always colorful, imaginative rhythm section. Other soloists include the wonderful Joanie Madden on Celtic whistles, PETER WORTMAN on English horn, and everybody's favorite cellist, DAVID DARLING.
Count Me In heads into the 90's with a sophisticated sound that's urban and urbane, yet evocative, up-front emotional, and direct.
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John Boswell - Festival of the Heart
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Track Listing
- O Come All Ye Faithful 3:25
- What Child Is This? (Greensleeves) 3:04
- God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen 4:29
- O Come, O Come Emmanuel 5:17
- Angels We Have Heard On High 3:35
- Hark! The Herald Angels Sing 4:21
- Festival of the Heart 3:10
- The First Noel 5:43
- It Came Upon the Midnight Clear 3:54
- Little Drummer Boy 6:30
- Oh Holy Night 2:16
- Away In a Manger 3:22
- Coventry Carol 2:15
- Fugue (from The Messiah) 2:13
- Silent Night 3:23
- Eastern Star 4:50
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- "John Boswell has made an album of transcendent Christmas music to shine through your Holiday each year. It is beautifully musical, yet spiritual at the same time. It's a MUST for your Holiday stocking!"
- JUDY COLLINS, Singer, Songwriter John Boswell likes to do things the hard way. Trying to build an identity in the notoriously overcrowded racks of solo piano albums, for example, is like inventing a better burger - possible, but...difficult. Yet the ardent fans of his two solo albums for the short lived Scarlet label (The Painter, 1988 and Kindred Spirits, 1989) have already gotten the message: this is an artist of uncommon gifts.
Lyricism, economy, and fullness of emotion are the hallmarks of the Boswell style. Turn this sensibility loose on some of the most cherished melodies of western folk and sacred music, add the tasteful, uncluttered orchestrations of producer BRIAN KEANE, season with a group of talented soloists, and you have the ingredients of a superior holiday album.
Christmas music isn't that easy either. The problem, in a word, is sentimentality. But Boswell and Keane have looked deep into these easily trivialized Christmas songs, discovered the core of beauty and essential emotion hidden under the years of kitsch and tinsel, and given each piece a fresh reading and a new radiance.
It's an exquisitely delicate line to tread. A piano phrase overplayed, a support instrument chosen carelessly, a tempo rushed, and you're off to the land of Welk. Festival of the Heart avoids the cliches and delivers an authentically musical experience. This is one holiday album you can give your grandmother, play for your children, and enjoy yourself.
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John Boswell - Kindred Spirits
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Track Listing
- Kindred Spirits 4:20
- Climbing 4:37
- Waterfall 3:27
- Plane Ride 3:20
- Heart of the Earth 3:38
- Rikki's Dream 3:53
- James and the Giant Peach Part II 4:15
- Strength in Silence 4:49
- Moscow 3:31
- Solidarity 4:58
- Night at the Beach 4:17
- Cornwall Bridge 5:12
- Kindred Spirits (reprise) 1:51
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"I began writing the music for Kindred Spirits early in 1989 in Manhattan. I had only lived there a little over a year and had been sub-letting apartments all over town. I didn't have a piano at the time, so I would go to the Hebrew Arts School on Broadway and rent a tiny room with a grand piano. I had great fun recording Kindred Spirits. I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed making it." - John Boswell When I began writing Kindred Spirits early in 1989 in Manhattan, I had only lived there a little over a year and had been sub-letting apartments all over town. I didn't have a piano at the time, so I would go to the Hebrew Arts School on Broadway and rent a tiny room with a grand piano. I would bring a tape recorder with me in case I got inspired while improvising. The rooms had little windows that looked out on the busy street below. I would stare out at all of the craziness on the streets and just be amazed that a city so small and with so many people could function as well as it did. Living in Manhattan made me realize how much we're all in this thing together. It also showed me how valuable friendship is; being on the roller coaster that is Manhattan was a lot more fun with friends on the ride with me.
Anyway, this experience gave me the idea to record Kindred Spirits. I wanted to do a very intimate recording with a couple of friends. I decided to record in L.A. where my musician friends lived.
DAVE KOZ (soprano sax) had been a friend for about five years (we met at music school) and I had always wanted to do something with him. At the time, he was in the band for The Pat Sajak Show and was just starting to work on his first recording. I was thrilled that he had the time to work on mine.
I met M.B. GORDY III (percussion) in the early eighties when we both got hired to play for a very experimental theater piece that required a lot of improvisation on both our parts. It was a play about poets during the Russian Revloution; we were playing onstage in full Russian attire with boots up to our knees. The experience was very intense and we both bonded because of that.
PATRICK GANDY (producer) is a very talented composer/arranger/pianist that I met at the same music school. At the school we would write one arrangement a week with varying orchestrations (sometimes a few instruments, sometimes a 40 piece orchestra) and stay up the night before the due date copying our charts for the musicians to play the next day. We were roommates for about a year and spent a lot of our time listening to music into the wee hours.
So, I had the team I wanted to work with ... We recorded over a two day period at Ray Parker Jr.'s studio, Ameraycan, the same studio where he recorded "Ghostbusters."
"Night at the Beach" was a total improvisation for all three of us. I asked Koz to pick a key and asked M.B. to pick a tempo. We just did it and ended up with a structured piece. We all looked at each other as the final chord was struck and smiled.
"Plane Ride" was written halfway at JFK airport while I was waiting to board the plane that took me to L.A. and the other half was written somewhere over Ohio. That was the first time I've ever written without an instrument.
"James and the Giant Peach II" is the sequel to "James and the Giant Peach" on The Painter. It's based on the children's book by Roald Dahl (one of my favorites). The main theme from the first "James" can be heard at the beginning and end of "James II." "Rikki's Dream" was written for my niece. She was just a baby when I wrote it. Now she's a very cute and smart six-year-old. "Strength in Silence," "Solidarity" and "Cornwall Bridge" are all improvisations. I've always wanted to visit Russia and was never able to, so I wrote "Moscow" instead.
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John Boswell - Love
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Track Listing
- Whispers
- Recollection
- Heart Dance
- Love Letter No. 1
- I'll Meet You There
- When You Take My Hand
- Toujours
- Love
- Absence
- Love Letter No. 2
- Rekindled
- From This Day
- Secrets Revealed
- Bliss
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John Boswell's Love is an elegant, evocative ode to the most universal of inspirations, a bouquet of romantic instrumentals and songs addressing matters of the heart. Following his 1999 GLAMA Award for Male Artist of the Year, Love will further enhance the profile of this LA-based musician as an artfully understated pianist and tunesmith with a deeply felt affection for beautiful contemporary melodies.
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John Boswell - Reflections of John Boswell
release date: Tue Jun 10 2003
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Track Listing
- Waterfall (MP3)
- Rikki's Dream (MP3)
- Thanks (MP3)
- Frontiers
- Kindred Spirits
- The Path
- Are You There
- Toujours
- One Night in Paris
- Promise of Rain
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Pre-Order Your Copy Today! In Stores June 20th.
Lyricism and fullness of emotion are the hallmarks of the John Boswell style. With each of his recordings, this extraordinary pianist has demonstrated his mastery of communicating deeply felt sentiment with a poignant, evocative, intelligent passion. His latest recording, REFLECTIONS OF JOHN BOSWELL is a collection of his masterful work. This Album features songs from his classic recordings. From the warm, richly romantic embrace of THE PAINTER, the reflection of life's experiences on KINDRED SPIRIT to the melodic grace of TRUST, each track on REFLECTIONS... spotlights Boswell's unique ability to skillfully explore the range of human emotion through the intimacy of his music. In a world overrun with generic artists, it's a relief to find a true original.
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John Boswell - The Painter
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Track Listing
- mafu 3:39
- london: 1892 / robert adrian edwards /Ęthe painter, part 1 3:41
- mona claire, part 2 3:06
- thanks 4:21
- child's eyes 4:13
- Four A.M. 4:09
- the quilt 3:13
- the path 5:33
- back to york 3:09
- james and the giant peach 4:16
- pleiades 5:14
- frontiers 6:00
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- The intimate solo piano improvisations and gently stirring "sound paintings" John Boswell performed on The Painter are among the most evocative and emotionally relevant compositions in his repertoire. There's a freshness to the twelve selections featured that stems from the timeless images and emotions that originally inspired Boswell to create this music. The ultimate test of a recording's worth is not how far it climbs the charts during the first six months of its release, but how people react to it five or six years down the road. With tastes changing and technological innovations developing at a feverish pace, many recordings that hit the mark the moment they left the factory sound dated, often laughably so, as time goes on. The reason is quite simple: when the glossy veneer of the latest fad tarnishes and wears away, the artistry, inspiration, and emotional substance of the music - or lack thereof - are mercilessly exposed.
JOHN BOSWELL's album, The Painter, has passed this difficult test. When the warm, richly romantic solo piano album was recorded back in 1988, listeners fell in love with it - those who were able to find it, that is. As the first of two Boswell discs released on the short-lived independent label Scarlet Records, The Painter didn't get the distribution or national attention it deserved. Even so, the lyricism, grace, and sincerity Boswell exhibited on The Painter, and his subsequent Scarlet release, Kindred Spirits, garnered a growing following of ardent fans despite the music's lack of mainstream exposure. It also brought Boswell's highly appealing style to the attention of Hearts of Space Records, leading to a pair of ensemble-based HOS recordings that provided a showcase for Boswell's talents as a band leader as well as a pianist/composer.
Yet after all these years, the intimate solo piano improvisations and gently stirring "sound paintings" Boswell performed on The Painter are among the most evocative and emotionally relevant compositions in his repertoire. There's a freshness to the twelve selections featured that stems from the timeless images and emotions that originally inspired Boswell to create this music.
Now that Hearts of Space has remastered and repackaged it to '90s standards, Boswell's first effort will at last find the audience it has long deserved. The Painter is one of those rare piano records to live with and savor again and again.
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John Boswell - Trust
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Track Listing
- Take My Hand 3:59
- On the Wind 5:37
- From the Heart 2:57
- I'll Carry You Through 7:00
- Trust 3:55
- Are You There 3:24
- Glimpse of Time 6:02
- Heart Full of Rain 4:33
- Leaf Dream 7:23
- Angel in the Ice 2:26
- Cloud Vision 3:09
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- On Trust, JOHN BOSWELL extends the signature warmth and melodic grace of his classic solo piano albums The Painter and Kindred Spirits with a touch of cello, oboe and strings. Poignant, sensitive, intimate, lyrical, satisfying: yyou'll find it all in Trust. Themes of nature and human emotion dance around each other on Trust. JOHN BOSWELL's fifth album radiates the mature optimism that comes from embracing life's challenges in the fullness of feeling, rather than shying away from them. To accomplish this musically, Boswell has stepped back from the ensemble sound that has characterized his most recent releases, and returned to the intimacy of the solo piano (occasionally offset by discrete synthesizer touches), approaching it with a deeply felt sensitivity and intelligent passion.
Trust opens with a surge of optimism, as the graceful melody of "Take My Hand" builds from its hymn-like opening chords to a stirring resolution. The image of a gossamer seed pod drifting on gentle breezes provides the inspiration for the fluid "On the Wind", with cascading upper-register ripples flowing freely. "From the Heart", embellished with subtle synthesizer orchestration, is a luxuriantly romantic love ballad that glows with a softly burnished warmth and engaging tenderness. The acclaimed Swiss cellist MARTIN TILLMANN provides an exquisite multi-tracked prelude to "I'll Carry You Through," and then joins John's piano in exploring a melodic theme ripe with a wistful poignancy. The title track follows, conveying a passionate hopefulness that rings out with strong, clear tones and a soaring melody that instantly etches itself on the brain.
"Are You There" then calls out like a lonely voice in the wilderness, while echoes of French minimalist Erik Satie haunt the spacious introspections of "Glimpse of Time", a lyrical meditation on the mysteries of creation and transience.
The final four tracks all draw heavily on nature imagery, while progressively escaping the constraints of form and slipping into more open-ended, improvisational territory. "Heart Full of Rain" perfectly captures the kind of reflective, melancholic mood evoked by a rainy day. The free-floating "Leaf Dream" unfurls at a suitably relaxed pace, as if the last leaf left dangling from a wintry tree was contemplating its fate. The lovely, airy melody of the all-too-short "Angel in the Ice" drifts by like the fleeting, paradoxical vision suggested by its enigmatic title, while "Cloud Vision" brings the album to a dreamy end, with its shimmery aura of reverberation evoking the oceanic feeling of lying on ones back looking up at the vastness of a cloud-speckled sky.
On Trust John Boswell demonstrates once again that he has mastered the elusive art of communicating deeply-felt sentiment without lapsing into facile sentimentality. The emotional honesty of his music is balanced by a technical sophistication and refined sensibility which enable him to skillfully explore the ways that nature affects the range of our human emotions.
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