Photos by GERMAN BARON

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Beauty Sleep
Hector Martignon
With Eddie Gomez, Kenny Barron, Jeff Watts, Mark Whitfield etc

Eddie's Ready
Hector Martignon
Composed for Eddie. Jeff Watts and Mark Whitfield and Sammy Figueroa play.

Tomorrow's Past
Hector Martignon
Horacio "Negro" Hernández, John Benítez, Edgardo Miranda

Nothing Personal
Don Grolnick
Ricchard Bona, Willard Dyson and Edgardo Miranda

Observatorio.
Hector Martignon
Matthew Garrison, Dafnis Prieto and Mark Whitfield

Refugé.
Hector Martignon
Ricchard Bona, Willard Dyson and Edgardo Miranda

REVIEWS On REFUGEE

His third album as a leader and freshman statement for this record label, pianist/composer Hector Martignon seemingly enlists the entire New York Latin-jazz musicians’ community for this rather zippy, and upbeat endeavor. These tracks feature bass heroes such as Eddie Gomez, Richard Bona and Matthew Garrison laying it all out within a variety of tempos and dynamically-inclined opuses. Oh, and let’s not forget drummers Dafnis Prieto, Jeff “Tain” Watts, Horacio “El Negro” Hernandez; pianist Kenny Barron, and guitarist Mark Whitfield lending their formidable wares as the list goes on.
At times, the musicians’ expenditure of raw energy would conceivably be ample enough to power New York City’s subway system. Therefore, a hefty portion of Martignon’s compositions are designed with impetus-building signatures; brisk Latin-jazz rhythms and pumping bass lines in concordance with the soloists’ zesty call/response mechanisms. They temper the flow a bit on the rock-funk tinged piece “You Won’t Forget Me,” featuring Whitfield’s medium-toned licks and the leader’s tuneful single note phrasings. Moreover, Martignon affords his band-mates’ room to explore and navigate amid catchy melodic hooks morphed with peppery Salsa grooves and much more. (Zealously recommended…) – Glenn Astarita EJAZZONLINE.COM

Just in — superlative Afro-Latin jazz release by pianist Héctor Martignon.
Martignon, who has worked with Irazu, Ray Barretto, Luis Bonilla, and Descarga Boricua, has brought together a crew of amazing players ...
The result is a nearly overwhelming blast of rhythm and chordal slight of hand. Recorded in four sessions, each with different players.
Highly Recommended. DESCARGA

I love every track. SOLAR LATIN JAZZ ONLINE

Controlled rhythmic articulation, a technique of compositional skill, & above all an intense imaginative artistic power is manifest in jazz pianist's Hector Martignon's delivery. Hector is unremitting in his projection of strict yet lavish, original, & aesthetic art. His choice of colossal talents of the likes of Eddie Gomez & Kenny Barron insures a project that is animated, but without any nonsensical romantics. Rather, the whole project takes on a warm, 'personal' matrix of performance due to the care Hector takes in his choice of sidemen. His subtle use of lightness, phrasing, accent, nuance, et al give this disc a real-time sense of sensitiveness. George W. Carroll/The Musicians' Ombudsman EJAZZONLINE.COM

HECTOR MARTIGNON/Refugee: Martignon is a real classic jazzbo in a good way. He respects tradition and gets some of this hippest cats around to show up for his sessions. Accordingly, he writes with them in mind and you get a very special kind of set. This outing is loaded with killer cats, like his past works, and the music is highly rewarding. Bringing in jazz pros from all tastes and generations, Martignon is no "Zelig", he's the core that holds it all together. Wonderful listening that’s going to take your ears to unexpected, welcome places sure to resoundingly open them wide. In fact, the music hits the ground running and you will be blown away by what a driving date this is that never let's up. Genre splicing a fusion attitude with a post bop mentality, Martignon has something really special on the
ball/ A pure killer date. MIDWEST RECORD

…very good music, inventive, played by excellent musicians.
For me, it's a wonderful discovery….
Serge Warin, RADIO CANAL BLEU, FRANCE

REFUGEE- Liner Notes

Few things are more rewarding for me as a musician than to hear my music performed by some of the greatest jazz instrumentalists in the world. I have been lucky to have several of them play regularly in my band. Most of the tunes on Refugee, my third CD but first on the ZOHO label, were composed and arranged with one or more of the featured performers in mind. We recorded two tunes each in four separate sessions. There was different personnel in each session, each representing four different moments in the continuing evolution of my band Foreign Affair.

For instance, I wrote Eddie's Ready thinking about the great 1970s Bill Evans Trio recordings that I devoured (and still do) in the early stages of my development as a musician. The unmistakable sound of bassist Eddie Gomez was just as appealing to my ears as was Bill Evans’ piano. Eddie made my tune his own, enveloping it with his unmistakable sound and imagination.

FOREIGN AFFAIR at Systems Two Sudios: Hector, Eddie Gomez, Mark Whitfield and Jeff Watts

For the other tune with Eddie, Beauty Sleep, I had a "cutting contest" in mind; those nights in Harlem in the early 1930s when pianists like James P. Johnson and his protege Fats Waller would challenge each other until ‘the wee hours’ of the morning… I called on my idol and teacher Kenny Barron to help me recreate a similar magic in this track. No one better than Jeff “Tain “ Watts to interact on the drums with musicians of such caliber and trajectory. Jeff has played quite a few gigs with me and knows most of my material, giving it his unique touch and spirit. My old friend Sammy Figueroa, also one of my favorite percussionists, added the perfect touch, performing an exquisite swinging low conga beat to the straight-ahead sections the late master Ray Barretto would have happily approved of.

FOREIGN AFFAIR in Systems Two with Matt Garrison, Dafnis Prieto, Hector and Mark Whitfield

When I first went to the island of Tahiti, as a guest at the Pacific Rim Music Festival, the stunningly beautiful setting inspired me to add lyrics to Observatorio, a tune I wrote for my wife Amparo. I was audacious enough to perform and sing the tune in what I consider my official debut as a “singer”. Back in New York I added the vocals to an instrumental version I had already recorded. Roberto Quintero’s percussion is superb, adding to the sub-tropical magic the tune was dreamed up in.

Observatorio is also featured in Samuel Torres’ first CD, “Skin Tones”, with English lyrics written and performed by Julie Dollison, who later made it the title tune of her own debut album, “Observatory’. At the time of this session, Matt Garrison’s unequivocal bass provided the foundation of the band’s sound. His solos on Observatorio and the other tune of this session, You Won’t Forget Me, are exquisite ad hoc compositions in their own right!

In these first four tunes, mentioned so far the common thread is the unmistakable guitar of my friend and longtime band member Mark Whitfield, adding incredible sweetness and virtuosity, besides a solid, swinging rhythmic foundation. I chose the ballad You Won’t Forget Me, one of two non-original cover songs on this album, with Mark’s unforgettable musicianship and sound in mind. Cuban drum-magician Dafnis Prieto joins Mark, Matt and Roberto in a fine filigree of sounds and colors, providing a subtle and intricate rhythmic infrastructure.

The title tune Refugee is my humble tribute to the millions of people forgotten by the world after they left their homes and their lives behind because of war, famine or natural disaster. I could only write the tune with the unsurpassable sound and art of Cameroonian bassist Richard Bona in mind. I consider myself lucky for having had him in my band for over a year and a half. My fellow Colombian, percussion prodigy Samuel Torres, accurately interpreted the spirit of the tune, adding several takes of African Djembe as well as multiple Afro-cuban Conga rhythms, including an incredible 3/2 Cumbia! - During sound checks and to warm up, we always played that beautiful G minor blues by the late Don Grolnick, Nothing Personal. Easy and powerful, the tune is a perfect vehicle to enjoy Richard's virtuosity. Willard Dyson's drumming in both tunes of this session is absolutely remarkable. His solo in the polyrhythmical Refugee is simply put mind-boggling! Edgardo Miranda fully proves that he is arguably the best Latin Jazz guitarist, though barely known outside the Latin Jazz scene.

FOREIGN AFFAIR on tour in Colombia: Hector, Richard Bona, Mark Whitfield and Jeremmy Gaddie

Edgardo’s playing is also masterful in the incomparable late-night session featuring one of the first editions of Foreign Affair. This all-latin “dream team” lived up to any and all expectations and recorded those two tunes as if we were on one of our habitual gigs in that most exquisite and intimate of New York Jazz Clubs, the Zinc Bar. 99 Macdougal is a perfect vehicle to showcase Horacio “Negro” Hernandez’ incredible sensitivity, complemented, not eclipsed, by his almost pyrotechnical virtuosity. In Tomorrow’s Past (similar to Refugée in its rhythmical intricacies and originally conceived as a 3/2 ballad) Horacio and bass virtuoso John Benitez, with Samuel on board, coalesce into the most infernal rhythm machine imaginable. John’s solo on 99 Macdougal takes us on a cruise through the different mystical lands that make up his musical world.

FOREIGN AFFAIR at the ZINC BAR. Edgardo Miranda, Horacio Negro Hernandez, John Benitez and Hector

Although I play the accoustic and electric pianos in all the tunes -except the electric on Beauty Sleep which is Kenny Barron- and sing the vocals on one track, I prefer the role I almost instinctively adopted, paraphrasing August Rodin: provide boulders of marble of distinctive shapes and sizes to a group of sculptors and then collectively carve out the most beautiful shapes imprisoned inside those rocks.

Hector Martignon

This album is dedicated to my wife, Amparo