Composers Jukebox

Never an artist lacking ambition, trumpeter Marquis Hill came up with a cool idea for his latest album Composers Collective: Beyond the Jukebox. Inspired by the Blue Note days when the label’s artists recorded their colleagues’ tunes alongside their own, the Chicago native reached out to his own pals and peers, asking them to write tunes with him in mind.

Award-winning trumpeter, composer and bandleader Marquis Hill, widely acclaimed for his soulful, eclectic modern jazz sensibility, is proud to present Composers Collective: Beyond the Jukebox, a new album celebrating the compositions of others: in particular, a group of cherished colleagues and friends, many of them fellow Chicagoans, invited by Hill to compose a piece for the album with him specifically in mind. In addition to six of Hill’s compositions, the program includes pieces by Ernest Dawkins, Gary Bartz, Jeff Parker, Marcus Strickland, SABA, Geof Bradfield and Matt Gold, as well as the members of Hill’s core quintet: vibraphonist Joel Ross, pianist Michael King, bassist Junius Paul and drummer Corey Fonville.

When the pandemic struck early in 2020, violinist Elena Urioste and pianist-composer Tom Poster responded by channeling their creative energies into #UriPosteJukeBox, a portmanteau of their surnames and a nod to the retro feel of the jukebox with its eclectic selection of songs to be chosen by the listener. The original intention was to produce one video of the duo performing together for every day of the lockdown (which at the time was anticipated to be relatively brief). What followed was a project that took off in ways the pair had never dreamed of, capturing the imaginations and hearts of listeners across the globe, embracing requests that traversed many musical genres, featuring commissions by contemporary composers, and entertaining followers with increasingly elaborate costumes, props, additional instruments, and multi-tracking.
In all, they made 88 videos – one for each key on a piano. The impact of the endeavor and the joy it brought in an extraordinarily challenging time were more formally recognized when the Jukebox won a Royal Philharmonic Society Inspiration Award. This album captures the spontaneous and varied feel of the original videos, drawing together some of the duo’s favorite pieces in a way that celebrates this joyous project and all those who contributed to it.

Michael Tilson Thomas and the Grammy Award-winning San Francisco Symphony present a new live recording of the first-ever concert performances of Leonard Bernstein’s complete score for the beloved musical "West Side Story". The recording boasts a talented cast of Broadway actors led by Alexandra Silber (Maria) and Cheyenne Jackson (Tony) alongside members of the San Francisco Symphony Chorus. Presented in a High Definition Premium Audio, this must-have album is the latest treasure from the Orchestra’s very own SFS Media label.

Ennio Morricone was probably the most famous film composer of the 20th century. He was also one of the most prolific composers working in any medium. No exact figure is available, but he scored over 500 films over several decades, plus many dozens of classical works. While his film scores were in almost every imaginable musical style (and for almost every imaginable kind of movie), he was most identified with the "spaghetti Western" style of soundtracks, which he pioneered when providing the musical backdrop for the films of director Sergio Leone. Morricone's palette was extraordinarily diverse, drawing from classical, jazz, pop, rock, electronic, avant-garde, and Italian music, among other styles. Esteemed by such important figures in modern music as John Zorn (not to mention contemporary directors like Martin Scorsese), he was frequently placed among not just the finest soundtrack composers but the most important contemporary composers of any sort.

Thievery Corporation played a historic concert in 2017 at The JFK Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. The show saw their songs re-imagined with orchestral arrangements from some of today's leading young classical composers. The show is now legendary, and those fortunate to attend heard Thievery Corporation in an entirely new way. To honor this show and inspiration it provided, Hilton and Garza have created "Symphonik" - recorded with Prague’s FilmHarmonic Orchestra along with Thievery Corporation's live band and engineering and co-production by Gianmaria Conti.

Inspired by the experimental sounds of the 60s and 70s, this eclectic set of dream-like instruments and textures is ideal for soundtracks, film scores, or anyone looking to spark offbeat production ideas.