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Chris Gestrin Stillpoint (SGL 1540-2) Release date: July 2002 with Chris Gestrin (piano, synthesizer, sampler, electronics), Brad Turner (trumpet, flugelhorn, electronics), Jon Bentley (tenor & soprano saxophone, bass clarinet, electronics), Andre Lachance (acoustic bass), Dylan van der Schyff (drums, percussion, electronics) with guests Joseph 'Pepe' Danza, percussion and Deanna Newton, voice Chris Gestrin is a great new talent, a Vancouver-based pianist, keyboardist and composer who might occasionally put you in mind of Bill Evans or Keith Jarrett, if either of those masters were young today and equally at home with the acoustic and the electronic, jazz and ambient. His handpicked, versatile quintet, featuring trumpeter Brad Turner (of the Canadian band Metalwood) and masterful drummer Dylan van der Schyff, creates rich images in sound. From a tender solo piano improvisation to swirling group inventions, a "narrative" of almost cinematic sweep unfolds. Gestrin's compositions range across jazz, experimental music, new age and world music for their ideas, but this is not "fusion" in any ordinary sense, there is too much originality and panache for that. The sessions were recorded in 24-bit/96K sound and mixed in analogue; the stereo version is a thing of beauty, while the multi-channel remix to Direct Stream Digital opens on an imaginary environment that connoisseurs of surround sound, whether jazz fans or not, will surely appreciate. Born just outside Vancouver in 1972, Chris Gestrin graduated from Boston's Berklee College of Music in 1995 and was top prize-winner of the 1996 Europ' Jazz Contest. He has become one of Vancouver's busiest pianists, keyboardists, effects artists, and soundtrack composers. He is a member of groups led by Kate Hammett-Vaughan, Chris Tarry, and Brad Turner, and co-leads or performs in many other bands of various kinds, from funk and soul jazz to less categorical combinations of jazz, fusion, ambient, and improv. He has recorded with roots musicians Zubot and Dawson and hip-hop artists The Rascalz and K-OS, and his music has been featured on Dark Angel and The Outer Limits. His current trio (with Andre Lachance and Dylan van der Schyff) and an earlier quartet have CDs on Maximum Jazz.

* stillpoint * never summer range * outpost * complex one/city * this past tuesday * words along a wire * movement and perspective * cliffs and clouds * my painted dream bird * interview with a child * 2.23 restart * shades of night descending