John Hollenbeck

Since their founding in the late 1990s, The Claudia Quintet has walked a unique path in contemporary jazz. Unlike most jazz ensembles where the particular musicians may come and go, drummer, composer and leader John Hollenbeck always wanted Claudia to be a 'band' with a sound not only determined by the compositions and the instrumentation, but with the actual players who perform the music.

Here is a new item from the variable ensemble of a self-made man who was a spotter for drug dealers and a thief of hubcaps in his teens, but somehow managed to graduate with degrees in economics and journalism and who has gone on to become one of the most interesting guitarists and composers in the current international scene: Scott Fields. This recording — and what a recording it is!

This CD demonstrates that smartly constructed compositions can have a captivating atmosphere and be a lot of fun at the same time. Henning Sieverts draws on the immense possibilities of the systematic and masterfully exploits these possibilities. With his ear attuned to continual change, Sieverts has made subtle use of symmetric material in the pieces on this CD.

By this day you get used to have only great albums coming from this new giant of the tenor saxophone, but watch out: “Voladores” is nothing less than a masterpiece, the best music ever Tony Malaby put to record.

The humorously titled Royal Toast is the fifth album from the Claudia Quintet, percussionist and composer John Hollenbeck's longstanding five-piece that is—in the eternal words of Duke Ellington—a band "beyond category." Eradicating the tenuous boundary lines between idioms, Hollenbeck and company draw on ethnic traditions, free jazz, contemporary composition and progressive rock in their multifac