Nicholas Payton - Sketches of Spain (2013)

On September 24th, for his 40th birthday week, Grammy-winning trumpeter Nicholas Payton offers the world a present worthy of his immense skills: a live concert performance of the iconic Miles Davis-Gil Evans collaboration, Sketches of Spain via his BMF Records imprint. Framing Payton’s virtuosic playing is a 19-piece ensemble comprised of 15 brass and woodwinds and a harpist drawn from the Sinfonieorchester Basel with conductor Dennis Russell Davies, and Payton’s long-time collaborators Vicente Archer on bass, Marcus Gilmore on drums, and Daniel Sadownick on percussion.

Sketches of Spain is Payton’s second release on BMF, which launched in February 2013 with #BAM Live at Bohemian Caverns, on which Archer and drummer Lenny White joined Payton playing trumpet and Fender Rhodes piano simultaneously. Here Payton focuses exclusively on the trumpet, which he places to his lips for around 90% of the 40-minute suite. In the process, he reaffirms his stature as a peerless master of his primary instrument. He rises to and transcends not only the physical challenge of functioning throughout the marathon at consistent levels of execution and creativity, but also the conceptual challenge of addressing and refracting into his own argot Davis’ indelible declamations from one of the second-largest selling recordings of all time.

Personnel:
Nicholas Payton, trumpet
Vicente Archer, bass
Marcus Gilmore, drums
Daniel Sadownick, percussion

Dennis Russell Davies, Conductor

Members of the Sinfonieorchester Basel
Woodwinds:
Stephane Rety
Rahel Leuenberger
Marc Lachat
Benedikt Shobel
Andreas Ferraino
Nikita Cardinaux

Trumpets:
Immanuel Richter
Marc Ullrich
Marc Hood
Manuela Fuchs

French Horns:
Jean-Francois Taillard
Henryk Kalinsky
Pascal Deuber

Tuba:
George Monch

Harp:
Aurelie Noll

Orchestral Percussion:
Szilard Buti