The Countdown 2017 | ollie howell

Described by the great Quincy Jones as “an unbelievable drummer. So creative I couldn’t believe it … he really is a 360-degree beautiful young cat”, Ollie Howell simply caught our attention with his expressive compositions. What stood out the most was that the drums did not stand out the most!

Self Identity is Ollie's second album, written post-surgery like a cosmic reminder to find the joy in life. The band -  Duncan Eagles on Tenor Saxophone, Ant Law on Electric Guitar, Henry Spencer on Trumpet, Matt Robinson on Piano, and Max Luthert on Double Bass - seem to intimately understand the mission. Of course, you cannot help but turn your attention back to the drummer, whose delicate style is gently leading the way, coaxing the travelers ion the path. Head over here to join Ollie on his journey. 

Featured Artist | David Cieri

David Cieri is a master composer, capable of the most subtle turns of phrase, and sensitive to every nuance of image and sound. His work ranges from the emotionally sublime to the rhythmically hypnotic, from the joyous to the foreboding. In this remarkable collection of work that he has composed for us over ten years, one can hear all of these feelings come together. From the spiraling ascendance of Meditation 9 to the ethereal breath of Into Another Life, Dave proves his gifts on each track. (Ken Burns)

"Collaborating with Florentine Films over the course of the last ten years has yielded music that I am very grateful and excited to share. To remove these compositions from their visual counterparts—from the bath that the images have been swimming in—and present them as expressions in their own right has its advantages. Working with these remarkable human beings has taught me a great deal about the potentials inherent in stitching together sound and image—the compositions are true co-conspirators in helping to have mutual influence over the film watcher and, in a sense, this music has “changed” the images as much as the images have framed the music.  

My first assignment for the Florentine gang—the stately “Leola” by Scott Joplin—works to accentuate the freedom and accessibility of our national treasures in The National Parks, while the swag in “Prohibition Ramble” was built to dance with a newly emerging sense of inner freedom, as exemplified in 'Prohibition'. After traveling to Vietnam to ready myself for writing and performing music for 'The Vietnam War', the music that eventually was tempted forth worked to etch out the mystery and the horror of our darkest potentials as humans, while never losing sight of our redeeming qualities.

This collection surveys the landscape of music I have made for these documentaries over the last ten years. I hope you imagine the films these compositions were made for, but I also hope you hear the love and friendship that I have steadily and increasingly been feeling for this gang of collaborators. Now that these compositions are “detached” from their original homes, I also hope they open you up to your own “scenes” and imaginings because, above and beyond anything else, I feel as Roger Ebert did about the movies: my wish is that this music activates our finer feelings and broadest sense of humanity as only art—empathy machines—can do."

The countdown 2017 | Kin4Life

From our label affiliate Artists First Records here in Philly comes the unique and articulate duo Kin4Life - IQ and Nor - the self described answer to the question 'what happened to the female rap game?'. These two are electric, full of energy and purpose and not afraid to have fun. 

A brilliantly woven mix of hip hop and R&B offerings, Firewerk from Kin4Life features production from Los Angeles based producer Parker Lewiz, Mount Vernon, NY’s Marsie Music, legendary New York producers DJ Mary Mac and DJ Jazzy Joyce, and in-house duo The KIN Factory. Other collaborators include musician prodigy Tosh the Drummer, NBC’s “The Voice” season four contestant Karina Iglesias and New Orleans rapper Look Alive.

The counTdown 2017 | Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah

Beginning 100 years after the first jazz recording, Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah announced The Centennial Trilogy : three full length albums that reflect deeply on the history of Jazz. In his words, Christian was ‘trying to create a document that fully acculturated all of the things that grew from the first century of jazz…. To force all of those things into one context as a means of creating a newer, larger context for artists to be able to grow from’

The scope of the trilogy is not limited to the music; Christian is using broad strokes to present his vision of the world. Growing up in the upper ninth ward he witnessed people enduring the same challenges regardless of their race or ethic background. Undereducated to serve the tourist culture, facing food insecurity and viewing each other as different because of the lens of race. He understood that race was and is a social construct, and saw that people could be working together to build and move forward.

The first release in the trilogy, Ruler Rebel, vividly depicts Adjuah's new vision and sound - revealing Adjuah to the listener in a way never heard before via a completely new production methodology that Stretches Trap Music with West African and New Orleanian Afro-Native American styles. Ruler Rebel is set for pre-order on 2/17/17, to coincide with the first annual Stretch Music Festival at Harlem Stage. The Stretch Music Festival, created and curated by Adjuah, explores the boundaries of Stretch, Jazz, Trap, and Alternative Rock with some of music’s most poised and fiery rising stars. The festival consists of five days of events, culminating with concerts on February 17th and 18th at Harlem Stage with performances by Butcher Brown, Braxton Cook, Venus, The Bridge Trio, Sarah Elizabeth Charles, and Matthew Stevens.