Enrico Rava (born 20 August 1939), is an Italian jazz trumpeter. He started on trombone, then changed to the trumpet after hearing
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926September 28, 1991) was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th century music, 20th-century music. Davis ado ...
.
Career
He was born in
Trieste
Trieste ( , ; ) is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is the capital and largest city of the Regions of Italy#Autonomous regions with special statute, autonomous region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia, as well as of the Province of Trieste, ...
, Italy.
His first commercial work was as a member of Gato Barbieri's Italian quintet in the mid-1960s; in the late 1960s he was a member of Steve Lacy's group. In 1967, Rava moved to New York City and, one month later, became a member of the group Gas Mask, which had one album released on Tonsil Records in 1970.
In the 1970s and 1980s, he worked with John Abercrombie,
Andrea Centazzo
Andrea Centazzo (born 1948) is an Italian-born American composer, percussionist, multimedia artist and record label founder.
Music career
Centazzo was born in Udine, Italy. In the 1970s he played percussion in avant-garde jazz with John Zorn, ...
Richard Galliano
Richard Galliano (born 12 December 1950, Cannes, Alpes-Maritimes) is a French accordionist of Italian heritage. Allmusic biography/ref>
Biography
He was drawn to music at an early age, starting with the accordion at 4, influenced by his father ...
,
Joe Henderson
Joe Henderson (April 24, 1937 – June 30, 2001) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist and very occasional flute player. In a career spanning more than four decades, Henderson played with many of the leading American players of his day an ...
Pat Metheny
Patrick Bruce Metheny ( ; born August 12, 1954) is an American jazz guitarist and composer.
He was the leader of the Pat Metheny Group (1977–2010) and continues to work in various small-combo, duet, and solo settings, as well as other side pr ...
Cecil Taylor
Cecil Percival Taylor (March 25, 1929April 5, 2018) was an American pianist and poet.
Taylor was classically trained and was one of the pioneers of free jazz. His music is characterized by an energetic, physical approach, resulting in comple ...
Carla Bley
Carla Bley (born Lovella May Borg; May 11, 1936 – October 17, 2023) was an American jazz composer, pianist, organist, and bandleader. An important figure in the free jazz movement of the 1960s, she gained acclaim for her jazz opera ''Escalator ...
Paul Motian
Stephen Paul Motian (March 25, 1931 – November 22, 2011) was an American jazz drummer, percussionist, and composer of Armenian descent. He played an important role in freeing jazz drummers from strict time-keeping duties.
Motian first came t ...
bebop
Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early to mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo (usually exceeding 200 bpm), complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerou ...
jazz, Rava has also played in
avant-garde jazz
Avant-garde jazz (also known as avant-jazz, experimental jazz, or "new thing") is a style of music and improvisation that combines avant-garde art music and composition with jazz. It originated in the early 1950s and developed through the late 1 ...
settings.
With trumpeter Paolo Fresu, Rava recorded four albums on the influence of
Bix Beiderbecke
Leon Bismark "Bix" Beiderbecke ( ; March 10, 1903 – August 6, 1931) was an American jazz cornetist, pianist and composer. Beiderbecke was one of the most influential jazz soloists of the 1920s, a cornet player noted for an inventive lyrical a ...
,
Louis Armstrong
Louis Daniel Armstrong (August 4, 1901 – July 6, 1971), nicknamed "Satchmo", "Satch", and "Pops", was an American trumpeter and vocalist. He was among the most influential figures in jazz. His career spanned five decades and several era ...
,
Chet Baker
Chesney Henry "Chet" Baker Jr. (December 23, 1929 – May 13, 1988) was an American jazz trumpeter and vocalist. He is known for major innovations in cool jazz that led him to be nicknamed the "Prince of Cool".
Baker earned much attention and ...
, and Miles Davis. Also of note are his albums ''Rava'', ''L'Opera Va' '' and ''Carmen'', which are his interpretations of operatic arias and overtures. In 2001, he founded a quintet with pianist Stefano Bollani and toured with Gato Barbieri and Aldo Romano. In the trio Europeans, he worked with
Eberhard Weber
Eberhard Weber is a German double bassist and composer. As a bass player, he is known for his highly distinctive tone and phrasing. Weber's compositions blend chamber jazz, European classical music, minimalism and ambient music, and are regarded ...
and Swiss percussionist Reto Weber.
In June 2005, Rava was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Music from
Berklee College of Music
Berklee College of Music () is a Private university, private music college in Boston, Boston, Massachusetts. It is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known for the study of jazz and modern Music of the United ...
at the twentieth anniversary of jazz education at the Umbria Jazz Festival, in Perugia, Italy.
In 2023, Rava assembled a band of young Italian jazz musicians called The Fearless Five, consisting of Matteo Paggi on trombone, Francesco Ponticelli on double bass, drummer and singer Evita Polidoro, and guitarist Francesco Diodati, and began touring the major European jazz festivals. In July 2024, he released the album ''Fearless Five'' with this new band, featuring new versions of some of his most famous songs such as "Lavori Casalinghi" and "The Trial".
Discography
As leader/co-leader
* ''
Il Giro Del Giorno in 80 Mondi
''Il Giro Del Giorno in 80 Mondi'' is an album by Italian jazz trumpeter and composer Enrico Rava recorded in 1972 and originally released in the International label and rereleased on the Italian Black Saint label in 1976.Black Saint, 1972)
* ''Katcharpari'' ( MPS/
BASF
BASF SE (), an initialism of its original name , is a European Multinational corporation, multinational company and the List of largest chemical producers, largest chemical producer in the world. Its headquarters are located in Ludwigshafen, Ge ...
, 1973)
* '' The Pilgrim and the Stars'' ( ECM, 1975)
* ''Pupa o Crisalide'' ( RCA, 1975)
* ''"Quotation Marks"'' ( Japo, 1976)
* '' The Plot'' (ECM, 1977)
* '' Enrico Rava Quartet'' (ECM, 1978)
* ''Ah'' Enrico Rava (ECM 1980)
* ''Opening Night'' Enrico Rava Quartet (ECM, 1981)
* ''Nexus Meets Enrico Rava'' (Four Leaf Clover 1984)
* ''Secrets'' (Soul Note, 1987)
* '' Volver'' with Dino Saluzzi (ECM, 1987)
* ''Quatre'' with D'Andrea, Vitous, Humair (Gala, 1989)
* ''Earthcake'' with D'Andrea, Vitous, Humair (Gala, 1991)
* ''Rava L'Opera Va'' (Label Bleu, 1993)
* ''Chanson'' (Gala, 1994)
* ''Nausicaa'' with Enrico Pieranunzi (EGEA, 1994)
* ''Bella'' with Pieranunzi, Pietropaoli, Gatto (Philology, 1994)
* ''Carmen'' (Label Bleu, 1995)
* '' Electric Five'' with Gianluigi Trovesi (Soul Note, 1995)
* ''For Bix and Pops'' (Philology, 1996)
* ''Noir'' (Label Bleu, 1996)
* ''Italian Ballads'' (Venus, 1996)
* ''Icon'' with Claudio Fasoli, Franco D'Andrea, (Flex, 1998)
* ''Ragazzi Selvaggi'' (Ricordi, 1998)
* ''Certi Angoli Segreti'' (Label Bleu, 1998)
* ''Rava Plays Rava'' (Philology, 1999)
* ''Duo En Noir'' with Ran Blake (Between the Lines, 1999)
* ''Shades of Chet'' (Via Veneto, 1999)
* ''Renaissance'' (Venus, 2002)
* ''Montreal Diary'' (Label Bleu, 2002)
* ''Smiling in Hollywood'' (GMG Music, 2002)
* ''What a Day!!!'' (Platinum, 2002)
* ''Full of Life'' (CAM Jazz, 2003)
* '' Easy Living'' (ECM, 2004)
* '' Tati'' (ECM, 2005)
* ''Jazzitaliano Live 2006'' (Casa Del Jazz, 2006)
* '' The Words and the Days'' (ECM, 2007)
* '' The Third Man'' (ECM, 2007)
* '' New York Days'' (ECM, 2009)
* ''Jazzitaliano Live 2009'' (Casa Del Jazz, 2009)
* ''
Tribe
The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide use of the term in English is in the discipline of anthropology. The definition is contested, in part due to conflict ...
'' (ECM, 2011)
* '' Rava on the Dance Floor'' (ECM, 2012) – live recorded in 2011
* ''The Monash Sessions'' (Jazzhead, 2014)
* '' Wild Dance'' (ECM, 2015)
* ''My Songbook'' (Casa Del Jazz, 2016)
* ''Roma'' with Joe Lovano (ECM, 2019)
* ''Edizione Speziale'' (ECM, 2021)
* ''The Song Is You'' with
Fred Hersch
Fred Hersch (born October 21, 1955) is an American jazz pianist, composer, and a 17-time Grammy nominée. He was the first person to play weeklong engagements as a solo pianist at the Village Vanguard in New York City. He has recorded more than ...
European Jazz Ensemble
* ''20th Anniversary Tour'' (Konnex, 1997)
* ''At the Philharmonic Cologne'' (MA Music, 1989)
Globe Unity Orchestra
* ''Jahrmarkt & Local Fair'' (Po Torch, 1977)
* ''Pearls'' (FMP, 1977)
* ''Compositions'' (Japo, 1980)
* ''Baden-Baden '75'' (FMP, 2011)
ICP Orchestra
* ''Live Soncino'' ICP Orchestra (ICP/Ad Lib, 1979)
Italian Instabile Orchestra
* ''Italian Instabile Festival'' (Leo, 1998)
* ''Litania Sibilante'' (Enja, 2000)
* ''Previsioni Del Tempo = Forecast'' (Imprint, 2002)
As sideman
With Gianni Basso
* ''Blue Woods'' (Philology, 2002)
* ''Tea for Two'' (Philology, 2005)
With
Andrea Centazzo
Andrea Centazzo (born 1948) is an Italian-born American composer, percussionist, multimedia artist and record label founder.
Music career
Centazzo was born in Udine, Italy. In the 1970s he played percussion in avant-garde jazz with John Zorn, ...
* ''Live'' (Ictus, 2002)
* ''Doctor Faustus'' (Ictus, 2006)
With Giorgio Gaslini
* ''Nuovi Sentimenti Suite'' (La Voce Del Padrone, 1966)
* ''Message'' (BASF, 1973)
With Steve Lacy
* ''
Sortie
A sortie (from the French word meaning ''exit'' or from Latin root ''surgere'' meaning to "rise up") is a deployment or dispatch of one military unit, be it an aircraft, ship, or troops, from a strongpoint. The term originated in siege warf ...
Franco Ambrosetti
Franco Ambrosetti (born 10 December 1941) is a jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist and composer. He was born in Lugano, Switzerland; his father, Flavio Ambrosetti, Flavio, was a saxophonist who once played opposite Charlie Parker.Karl Berger, ''No Man Is an Island'' (Douglas Music 1997)
*
Carla Bley
Carla Bley (born Lovella May Borg; May 11, 1936 – October 17, 2023) was an American jazz composer, pianist, organist, and bandleader. An important figure in the free jazz movement of the 1960s, she gained acclaim for her jazz opera ''Escalator ...
, ''
Escalator over the Hill
''Escalator over the Hill'' (or ''EOTH'') is mostly referred to as a jazz opera, but it was released as a "chronotransduction", with "words by Paul Haines (poet), Paul Haines, adaptation and music by Carla Bley, production and coordination by Mic ...
Dollar Brand
Abdullah Ibrahim (born Adolph Johannes Brand on 9 October 1934), previously known as Dollar Brand, is a South African pianist and composer. His music reflects many of the musical influences of his childhood in the multicultural port areas of Cap ...
, ''African Space Program'' (Enja, 1974)
* Barbara Casini, ''Vento'' (Label Bleu, 2000)
*
Mario Castelnuovo
Mario Castelnuovo (born 25 January 1955) is an Italian singer-songwriter and composer.
Life and career
Born in Rome, after the diploma in surveying Castelnuovo studied French literature at the university, specializing in Occitan literature, Prov ...
, ''Come Sara Mio Figlio'' (RCA Italiana 1991)
* Marc Ducret, ''Gris'' (Label Bleu, 1990)
* Ivano Fossati, ''La Disciplina Della Terra'' (Columbia, 2000)
* Roberto Gatto, ''Roberto Gatto Plays Rugantino'' (CAM Jazz, 2000)
* George Gruntz, ''Happening Now!'' (hat ART, 1988)
* Gunter Hampel, ''Angel'' (Birth, 1972)
* Matthew Herbert, ''The State Between Us'' (Accidental, 2019)
* ICP Orchestra, ''Live Soncino'' (Instant Composers Pool, 1979)
* Stafford James, ''Jazz a Confronto 26'' (Horo, 1976)
*
Robin Kenyatta
Robin Kenyatta (March 6, 1942 – October 26, 2004) was an American jazz alto saxophone, alto saxophonist.
Early life
Born Robert Prince Haynes in Moncks Corner, South Carolina, Kenyatta grew up in New York City and began playing the saxophone a ...
Massimo Ranieri
Giovanni Calone (born 3 May 1951), known professionally as Massimo Ranieri, is an Italian singer, actor, television presenter and theatre director.
Biography Early life
Ranieri was born in Borgo Santa Lucia, Naples, the fifth of eight children ...
Archie Shepp
Archie Shepp (born May 24, 1937) is an American jazz saxophonist, educator and playwright who since the 1960s has played a central part in the development of avant-garde jazz.
Biography Early life
Shepp was born in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, but ...
Cecil Taylor
Cecil Percival Taylor (March 25, 1929April 5, 2018) was an American pianist and poet.
Taylor was classically trained and was one of the pioneers of free jazz. His music is characterized by an energetic, physical approach, resulting in comple ...