RILEY
Presenting music from the debut album, “an adventurous tapestry pretty much unlike anything you've heard before” (textura).
A deep admiration for the American songbook can also be heard all over Riley, the solo debut by the 32 year-old Mulherkar. But love of song is only half of the album’s primary pull. The other is the sonically modern setting for Mulherkar’s vulnerable, melodious interpretation of this rich tradition, a sound design shaped by producers Rafiq Bhatia and Chris Pattishall. Enveloping Mulherkar within a series of textured, intricately-crafted spaces, Bhatia and Pattishall train a cinematographer’s lens on the continuum of great old songs, as well as new Mulherkar pieces which fit right in. It’s a radically bold audio framework for the emotional pronouncements of Riley’s horn.
“Our mantra,” says the trumpeter, “was to make a record that sounds how jazz makes me feel — even if it doesn't sound like jazz all the time. How, when I hear King Oliver, I feel the momentum shift, how hard the beat drops, and how hard Jelly Roll Morton's going on the piano. That's the emotion I get. We wanted to try to create a world that conveys this feeling in its own way.”
The Westerlies
The Westerlies, “an arty quartet…mixing ideas from jazz, new classical, and Appalachian folk” (New York Times) are a New York-based brass quartet comprised of Riley Mulherkar and Chloe Rowlands on trumpet, and Andy Clausen and Addison Maye-Saxon on trombone.
Formed in 2011, the self-described “accidental brass quartet” takes its name from the prevailing winds that travel from the West to the East. “Skilled interpreters who are also adept improvisers” (NPR’s Fresh Air), The Westerlies explore jazz, roots, and chamber music influences to create the rarest of hybrids: music that is both "folk-like and composerly, lovely and intellectually rigorous” (NPR Music). Equally at home in concert halls and living rooms, The Westerlies navigate a wide array of venues with the precision of a string quartet, the audacity of a rock band, and the charm of a family sing-along.
Jazz at Lincoln Center Presents: Songs We Love
First presented as the 2016 Season Opener at Jazz at Lincoln Center, Songs We Love is a journey through the first 50 years of jazz song. Under the musical direction of Riley Mulherkar, guest vocalists have included NEA Jazz Master Dee Dee Bridgewater, Brianna Thomas, and Vuyo Sotashe, joining an all-star 10-piece band made up of New York’s rising stars. Combining their distinct talents, the group will sing their way through four decades of music, beginning with the early blues and jazz of the 1920s and ending in the early 1950s. Iconic singers to be explored include Ma Rainey, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, and Judy Garland.
Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age
Scottish-American polymath Alan Cumming returns with his new cabaret show Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age, an evening of story and song celebrating and exploring his puckish, eclectic spirit and joie de vivre, with a joyful and mischievous exploration of that most communal of pastimes: aging! Select performances featuring Riley Mulherkar.
Anna Deavere Smith: Notes From The Field (HBO)
Tony and Pulitzer Prize nominee Anna Deavere Smith brings her acclaimed one-woman show of the same name to the screen. The HBO Film presentation dramatizes accounts of students, parents, teachers and administrators caught in America’s school-to-prison pipeline, which pushes underprivileged, minority youth out of the classroom and into incarceration. Score by Marcus Shelby, with additional music composed and performed by Riley Mulherkar and Lisa Fischer.