Ascent to the Blues Alex Sipiagin

• 1 Dolphin's View 06:53
• 2 Blues for Wood 05:25
• 3 Doppio 05:27
• 4 Infant Eyes 06:57
• 5 Hindsight 04:35
• 6 No Doubts 05:54
• 7 Rush Hour 04:38
• 8 One More Shot 08:39
• 9 Novgorod Bells 09:15
• 10 Sandrigo Blues 04:16
• 11 Twelve More Bars to Go 06:08
• Total Runtime 01:08:07

Info for Ascent to the Blues

The sky is well within reach when trumpet player extraordinaire Alex Sipiagin sets his sights on the summit and heads off upward in an Ascent to the Blues for his second release on Posi-Tone Records. The session features the focused wizardry of Sipiagin’s incisive technique, gripping tonality and hard hitting melodicism are countered cleverly against the curvature of contributions from Diego Rivera on tenor saxophone, the cool complexities of Art Hirahara on piano, the steady underpinnings of Boris Kozlov on bass, and the bombastic metrics of Rudy Royston on drums and percussion. While the album program remains decidedly straight forward and rooted in the blues throughout, the music is also elegantly lyrical and brilliantly evocative of a truly modern jazz sensibility. With a flawless combination of effortless mastery and brilliant performances, Sipiagin's “Ascent to the Blues" reaches steadily upward toward new heights and provides a clear pathway of inspirational bright moments for jazz fans everywhere to joyfully ascend again and again.

Alex Sipiagin, trumpet, flugelhorn
Diego Rivera, tenor saxophone
Art Hirahara, piano, Fender Rhodes (tracks 1, 3, 6, 8, 10)
Boris Kozlov, double bass, electric bass (track 1)
Rudy Royston, drums, percussion

Recorded September 15 & 16, 2021 at Acoustic Recording, Brooklyn, NY
Mixed & mastered at Woodland Studio, Lake Oswego, OR
Engineered by Nick O’Toole
Produced by Marc Free

Alex Sipiagin
Jazz Festivals worldwide has seen Alex Sipiagin performing with the likes of Dave Holland, Michael Brecker, the Mingus groups, etc. Born on June 11, 1967 inYaroslavl, Russia, Alex began studying the trumpet at age 12, studying at the Moscow Music Institute and the Gnessin Conservatory in Moscow where hereceived his Baccalaureate. In 1990, Alex participated in the International Louis Armstrong Competition sponsored by the Thelonius Monk Institute in WashingtonD.C. winning top honors and soon after relocated to the jazz mecca of the world, New York City.

Alex soon became a favored player for various bands including the Gil Evans Orchestra, Gil Goldstein's Zebra Coast Orchestra, the George Gruntz ConcertJazz Band, drummer Bob Moses' band Mozamba, Mingus Big Band as well as the Mingus Dynasty and Mingus Orchestra, and the Dave Holland Big Band, Sextetand Octet groups.

In 2003 he recorded with Michael Brecker's Quindectet touringalso with the Michael Brecker Sextet. Alex has also worked with Eric Clapton, Dr.John, Aaron Neville, Elvis Costello, Michael Franks, Dave Sanborn, Deborah Cox, legendary producer Phil Ramone, Gonzalo Rubalcaba, etc., and many of the recordings he has been involved in has been nominated and/or won the Grammy's (Dave Holland Big Band's "What Goes Around," and "Overtime,"Michael Brecker's Qindectet "Wide Angles").

As a soloist, Sipiagin has eleven recordings out to his credit and has toured extensively throughout Europe, U.S., Japan and Russia with his own group. Healso teaches at the Groningen Prince Claus Conservatory, Academy of Music, Basel, Switzerland as well steady professorship at NYU.

Recorded 15 solo albums for one of prestiges jazz label "CrissCrossJazz" His recent album of his compositions and arrangements "Balance 38-58" features such noted musicians as Eric Harland, David Binney, Adam Rogers and Matt Brewer.

This album contains no booklet.