Danilo Pérez Across The Crystal Sea

One unknown place led to the realization of Across the Crystal Sea, an orchestral recording with Perez and a stellar quartet (bassist Christian McBride, drummer Lewis Nash, percussionist Luis Quintero and vocal stylist Cassandra Wilson on two tracks) performing with none other than arranger/conductor Claus Ogerman, whose work is synonymous with excellence. One who possesses an affinity with jazz as heard in his collaborations with Antonio Carlos Jobim, Bill Evans, Diana Krall, Michael Brecker and others.

German-born composer and arranger Claus Ogerman, born in 1930, must rank as one of the most versatile musicians of the twentieth century. When he was at his peak in the 1970s, writing everything from ballet scores to arrangements for Brazilian composer Antonio Carlos Jobim, diva Barbra Streisand, and jazz/R&B saxophonist George Benson, there was hardly a radio station on the dial where his music wasn't heard during the course of a typical day – and he's still quite active. The key to his success has been his ability to stay in the background behind the musician he's working with and yet create something distinctive. This 1982 collaboration with the late jazz saxophonist Michael Brecker is one of his most successful works, not least because the overlap between the extended harmonies of jazz and the chromaticism of the late German Romantic polyphony in which Ogerman was trained is large enough to allow Brecker to operate comfortably – his improvisations seem to grow naturally out of the background, and the intersections between jazz band and orchestral strings come more easily here than on almost any other crossover between jazz and classical music.