Melissa Aldana

Melissa Aldana can be an award-winning jazz tenor saxophonist and innovator from the Crash Trio, also featuring bassist Pablo Menares and drummer Francisco Mela. Created in Santiago, Chile in 1988, Aldana may be the daughter from the renowned tenor saxophonist Marcos Aldana. Her dad was also an trainer, and from age six she insistently started to demand that he instruct her how exactly to play. After learning the two records he offered her to try out, he got her an alto and her formal research began. His major way for her was transcription of solos from cassettes; the first designer she learned to try out from was Charlie Parker. Though she discovered from all of the great alto experts, it had been upon hearing Sonny Rollins that her musical program changed path irrevocably and she requested to get a tenor rather. She received a Selmer Tag VI from her grandfather Enrique (who got taught her dad to try out); she’s used it since. At age 16, Aldana had been headlining jazz night clubs around Santiago. When she found that Panamanian pianist Danilo Pérez was arriving at Chile within the Wayne Shorter Quartet, she was established to meet up him — his wife have been students of her father’s. That conference demonstrated fateful. After hearing her, he asked her to try out the Panamanian Jazz Event. She had not been just well received, but Pérez brought her to america and organized auditions on her behalf on the Berklee University of Music and the brand new Britain Conservatory. Though recognized by both academic institutions, she gained a scholarship or grant to Berklee. There she examined under Joe Lovano, Greg Osby, Costs Pierce, and Ralph Peterson, to mention several. Upon graduation, she relocated to NY and was mentored further by George Coleman. She also woodshedded in night clubs, sitting down in and learning from various other musicians. Her initial date being a head, Free of charge Fall, was released by Osby’s Internal Group Music label this year 2010. In support, she performed not only night clubs in NY but a bunch of Western european jazz celebrations. Her sophomore work, Second Cycle, premiered in 2012. She produced the Crash Trio afterwards that calendar year — she acquired known Menares in the Chilean picture years before. The group quickly set up a rapport and became a go-to straight-ahead device known for both originals and criteria. At age 24, in Sept 2013, Aldana gained the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition. The jurors had been Jane Ira Bloom, Branford Marsalis, Jimmy Heath, Shorter, and Bobby Watson. She was the initial feminine instrumentalist ever to earn the competition. Section of her reward was a documenting agreement with Concord Jazz; the label released Melissa Aldana & Crash Trio in the summertime of 2014. The recording earned wide essential see and was asked to try out a few of the most renowned jazz celebrations in the globe like the Playboy Jazz, Monterey, Umbria, Marciac, Pori, and Molde phases. She also performed prestiigious clubs like the Blue Take note, Jazz Regular, Smalls as well as the Regatta Pub. She performed with Jimmy Heath in the 2014 NEA Jazz Experts Award Wedding ceremony. In 2015, Wynton Marsalis asked her towards the Jazz at Lincoln Middle. Aldana’s second Crash Trio recording, BACK was released by Wommusic in March of 2016, with drummer Jochen Rueckert changing Mela.