Clarinettist and Pianist Adrian Galante makes his Birdland Debut!
 

“I’ve heard all the great jazz clarinet players and Adrian doesn’t really sound like any of them, he really has a sound all of his own” says esteemed music critic Will Friedwald. “In his playing, you don’t miss the human voice at all. He really communicates the story without the specific words, and you know exactly what he’s thinking.”
 

Though initially drawn to the acrobatic playing of Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman and other clarinet virtuosi as a young student of the instrument, Galante soon found himself desiring to emulate the sounds of the great vocalists he heard. “I’ve always been very influenced by great singers...” says Galante “I remember hearing Tony Bennett talk about the way Bing Crosby revolutionized popular singing, getting right up close up the microphone making a very intimate sound…I like to approach the clarinet in same way, using that principle of playing at a softer volume and really using the microphone to help illuminate all the very subtle nuances and details of the sound.”
 

Joining Adrian for this performance is a stellar trio comprised of two time GRAMMY award winning pianist Alan Broadbent, prolific bassist and composer Jay Leonhart and current drummer for Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Centre Orchestra, Obed Calvaire.
 

 “He’s one of the few very young musicians of his age that seems to be comfortable with this notion of narrative form” says Friedwald. “He really gets what the songs are about and that’s something that usually comes much later in the development of musicians and singers, they don’t really tap into that emotional side, that passionate side, that erotic side until later on and it’s just another remarkable thing about Adrian and his music.”