Clayton Wright Jazz Piano Trio

Hello,
I am checking out your music on N1Music. I might do a review.
There are some really good bands on N1Music.
Did you listen to cd's on Jango Radio or Amazon?
It's free on Jango. (expired link)
Later,
Clayton Wright
(expired link)
Cosmic Dances - Featuring Flute, jazz rock and jazz- pop classical. The flute parts are from the Yamaha 8-88 synthesizer played by the composer. Some bass and piano tracks are from the Yamaha P-80. Also Cosmic Dances was published without flute.
DISCOLOGY:
2013: An Evening With Jazz (Jazz Piano Trio)
2013: Cosmic Dances - Featuring Flute (Trio plus Flute)
2013: Maison du Soleil (solo jazz piano)
2013: Piano Reveries (solo classical style piano)
2011: Cosmic Dances (Jazz rock and bossa nova, with guitar, piano, bass synths)

2010: Luminaire Jazz Nights (Jazz Piano Trio)

2007: Serenade in Blue (Jazz Piano Trio),

2006: Jazz Escapades (Jazz Piano Trio),

2005: Jazz Voyages (Jazz Piano Trio), Clayton Wright Jazz Piano Trio, Clayton Wright, piano, Billy Brockmann, stand-up jazz bass, and Mark Miley, drums.

2004: a solo piano CD: MOONDUST (19 solo jazz piano tunes),

2003: two new compilation CDs: (DOREMI) NIGHT and MORNING.

2002: CD compilation: (Coffee House Music, CDREVIEW) COFFEE PIANO.

2001: a CD compilation: (Salzburger Echo, Fanfare Publications) PASTEURIZED. The title tune on the REFLECTIONS CD (Reflections of Love) was translated to (Spiegel der Liebe) and re-recorded by SALZBURGER ECHO, in Salt Lake City, Utah.

1999: a solo piano CD: (Audiosphere), PRELUDES AND REVERIES, modern and New Age piano,

1999: REFLECTIONS (Classical solo piano, 21 tunes)(Audiosphere). REVIEW (Jazz Escapades CD): Mellow and sparkling! Reviewer: Kathy Parsons I have reviewed several of Clayton Wright’s solo piano albums in the past, but this is the first one with his trio. “Jazz Escapades” sparkles with the joy of making music and interacting with like-minded musicians. Wright helms the Trio at the piano, and is joined by Mark Miley on drums and Billy Brockmann on bass. The music creates the ambiance of a jazz lounge where the mood is easy and upbeat. The Trio melds improvisation with composition, and all of the pieces are smooth and mellow, drawing from bebop, cool, and traditional jazz stylings. Wright composed all of the music, and, to these ears, this is by far his best album to date. Quite a few of the songs have been on Wright’s solo piano albums, but the Trio breathes new life into them and makes them really shine. Although the mood is fairly consistent from start to finish, the pieces are distinctive, making this CD easy on the ears in the background or with full concentration. The CD opens with “Ultracool Cats,” a piece that is a bit aloof and yet playful, setting the tone for the album. “Nightlife” is one of my favorites - cool, silky, and graceful - what a great tune for a slow dance! I really like “Mirage,” too. On the dark side, it hides a mysterious secret as it teases and tantalizes. “The Humble Bumblebee” is as easy-going as they come as it moseys from flower to flower without a care in the world. “Afterglow” is a bit more reflective and thoughtful. “Momentum” is more energetic, but remains in the cool and breezy groove. “Driftwood” floats freely on a cloud of sea foam, in no rush to go anywhere. I really enjoyed reviewing “Jazz Escapades” and look forward to hearing what else the Clayton Wright Trio comes up with. Recommended for fans of mellow jazz. This album is amazingly interesting, sort of intellectually inspiring, and fun.


Review of Nightlife (Jazz Escapades) by Shouldergreye,
Syracuse, (expired link).

Great soundtrack music
great piano playing, it's got soul in it. The
melody is stimulating, doesn't get off track
or get boring. the mood of nostalgia and
better days is successfully kept throughout
the song. Would be perfect in a movie
soundtrack, opening credits music while
we're looking at panoramic new york in the fall.


- sholdergreye
Syracuse, New York
Reviews of Nightlife by Clayton Wright Jazz Piano Trio


Review of Nightlife (Jazz Escapades) by Charlie North
Lima, Ohio

Tinkle The Keys!
Very warm and rich piano song! The mood
is wonderful ala some of Bruce Hornsby
compositions. Nice change of pace to sit
back and listen to and I listened twice cause
I didn't want the mood to end. I usually sing
off keep rockin but to you just...thanks!
CharlieNorth

- charlienorth_
Lima, Ohio

Review of Nightlife (Jazz Escapades CD)by Klinejp
Mobile, Alabama

Jazz blues
Very sweet traditional blues / jazz feel. I
could listen to stuff like this all day. Very
cool, very pleasant, and well played. I love
the piano... very sensitive and dynamic... good
feel for improv around the central melodic and
harmonic themes. Good work!

klinejp
Mobile, Alabama

Reviews of Nightlife by Clayton Wright Jazz Piano Trio

review by killermater
Salt Lake City, Utah

Open a bottle of wine and get lucky
Passionaatly played Oh it definately
put her in the mood. Soothing music
changed my whole outlook thanks.

- killermater
Salt Lake City, Utah

Artist URL
(expired link)


Review by moonbop
Kozy 101.5
Soothing. piano bar music. makes
me want to order a scotch on the
rocks. Melody is again soothing.
relaxing mood. Easly listening. Good work


- moonbop



Review by mrmeanorbass
Hohenwald, Tennessee
easy listening
this song would be good for 2 things,
recovering from a hangover and
drinking in a lounge in vegas, both
are plusses in my book, the piano
and melody were done really well, all
around its a good piece of work.


- mrmeanorbass
Hohenwald, Tennessee
Review from Shouldergreye Syracuse, (expired link).
"Great soundtrack music,
great piano playing, it's got soul in it. The
melody is stimulating, doesn't get off track
or get boring. the mood of nostalgia and
better days is successfully kept throughout
the song. Would be perfect in a movie
soundtrack, opening credits music while
we're looking at panoramic new york in the fall.
Clayton Wright, Master of Music in Composition and Piano, winner of national music competitions, has released a new CD called JAZZ ESCAPADES for jazz piano trio (piano, drums, bass), produced by Audiosphere Music Company.

Review of REVERIES CD: (Apr. 19, 2003) by Walter Jon Anholt (composer/pianist/music publisher), Music Critic of Goldcoast Music Review:
"REVERIES is one of the most perfect albums that I have ever heard. When I listen to REVERIES by Clayton Wright, I imagine a colorful and grandiose ballet."

Review of REVERIES CD: (Apr. 19, 2003) by Billy Daves, Music critic of Goldcoast Music Review:
"REVERIES is spontaneous, subconscious, automatic sounding music. It equates the "DANCE OF LIFE". REVERIES is music with high contrast and running melodic lines flowing. You cannot get into a difficult discussion of the images that people see in it very much (it is so complex). People have so many images of it, and it would take a lot of time to go into a lengthy discussion of it."

(expired link)
(expired link)
(expired link)
REVIEW FROM (expired link): Regarding tune: Nightlife

In a Sentimental Mood
Here's a beautiful, lush trio ballad in the 40's standard tradition--sweet and pretty, straight from the Starlight lounge, atop the (your city's tallest skyscraper here...) building.

The progression is more complex and meandering than most standards, as is the melody--we're almost getting into Bill Evans' "Turn Out the Stars" territory in terms of the sheer number of chord changes over a ballad head, so maybe I misspoke at first--maybe it's more a 50's tradition. On the other hand, so many of the chords are voiced in root position (or at least in static, not very forward-leaning tension/release structures) that it actually harkens back even further than the 40's....oh, bother--it's pretty, let's just leave it at that.

The acoustic bass sounds somewhat wooden--well, of course it's wooden! What I mean is that it would have been nice if the microphone or pickup could have been placed in a position where more of the sustain of the strings and body could have been captured.

In this case the drums should probably not have been so hot in the mix--it makes the whole thing sound sort of brittle, particularly in view of the stylistic mismatch between the broken-up swing pattern on the snare drum and the much more-straight-8th (and more idomatically "correct") ballad style delivered by the pianist. The excess of high-frequency content coming from the drums sounds sort of mettalic, or as if the recording were done in a very live room with ceramic-tile walls. I kept wishing the swish pattern would continue without the little swing 'tail' at the end of every 2 beats, so that the music could flow more smoothly and stake its rightful claim in ballad-land.

The melody is very pretty but not very clearly defined, as in "here's the beginning and here's the end" And it has a hard time competing with the harmonic rhythm--there are so many changes (some of which sound a bit stilted, as if they didn't really know which way they are leaning) that the whole thing sounds restless and unfocused, like a ship at sea that never reaches port. The restlessness is exacerbated by the tempo, which if it were just a little bit slower would allow the tune to breathe a little. As it is it sounds more like a recitation of well-written prose describing a pleasant dinner date than an ode to lost love.

There are some nice lines performed by the pianist--a slower tempo would help them to breathe more too. The improvised section (is that an improvised section?) in the middle is so similar in style and content to the main body of the tune that it's hard to know exactly what constitutes the melody and what's further development. Perhaps this tune is meant to be entirely melodic with no solo, I dunno.

When we finally reach the end, the whole thing is brought to a clear and unambiguous ending with a nice flourish in the piano--but by now we've been wandering around in chord progression-land so long that there's not much pull to the conclusion--the end is clear, but it's less satisfying easy-chair-by-the-fireplace payoff than the feeling of finally reaching your train stop in the suburbs so that you can drive your car home.

It takes a lot of guts to write a tune in this style, in this day and age, when there are 1000+ page fake books full of standard after standard written in the time when they were the "top 40" of their era, the featured tunes on "Your Hit Parade." It's really tough to squeeze a new page in such a worked-over, time-worn dog-eared book, and while this is a courageous effort, it would probably be more successful if it were trying to be just one tune instead of a "brief history of jazz." There's so much packed in here that it's hard to follow the thread, and it wanders so much without ever resolving anywhere that it's almost exhausting.

A famous saxophonist (I can't recall which one) once said, "ballads are the toughest--you can hear every hour of every day of every year a guy's put into his horn on a ballad."

Amen, brother.
Extra Credit: Keyboards, Originality.

- noiseartist
Muncie, Indiana
December 4th, 2004

REVIEW of NIGHTLIFE by Clayton Wright:

I'm Humbled
Ohhh beautiful I could write like this in my dreams. If my heart was as pure as this, I'd be in heaven. Such a melody. This can't be written, this is something that falls like dew off the wings of a nightingale on a moonlit night. The mood is sublime. Can't you hear the piano telling it's old freind, the bass about how it loved and lost. And the drums, sits between the two, with an arm around their shoulders. Drinking buddies who know each other intimately and can sit in comfortable silence, but for now...they talk and listenn to each.
Such a wonderful composition...I'm humbled.

Extra Credit: Mood.

- Geetan
Manchester, Cheshire, United Kingdom
November 28th, 2004

REVIEW of NIGHTLIFE by Clayton Wright:

Class & Elegance makes me melt, like an ice cube in a crock
Very elegant sound, I love the drums, the smooth stirring. The piano is absolutely wonderful, it totally sets a wonderful mood for the song. This piece is very relaxing, has that comfortable "Charlie Brown" music to it. Bravo!

Extra Credit: Drums, Keyboards, Mood, Originality, Best Potential Movie Soundtrack.

- zzredwings
St. Clair, Michigan
October 17th, 2004

DISCOLOGY:
2013: An Evening With Jazz (Jazz Piano Trio)
2013: Cosmic Dances - Featuring Flute (Trio plus Flute)
2013: Maison du Soleil (solo jazz piano)
2013: Piano Reveries (solo classical style piano)
2011: Cosmic Dances (Jazz rock and bossa nova, with guitar, piano, bass synths)
2010: Luminaire Jazz Nights (Jazz Piano Trio)
2007: Serenade in Blue (Jazz Piano Trio),
2006: Jazz Escapades (Jazz Piano Trio),
2005: Jazz Voyages (Jazz Piano Trio), Clayton Wright Jazz Piano Trio, Clayton Wright, piano, Billy Brockmann, stand-up jazz bass, and Mark Miley, drums.
2004: a solo piano CD: MOONDUST (19 solo jazz piano tunes),
2003: two new compilation CDs: (DOREMI) NIGHT and MORNING.
2002: CD compilation: (Coffee House Music, CDREVIEW) COFFEE PIANO.
2001: a CD compilation: (Salzburger Echo, Fanfare Publications) PASTEURIZED. The title tune on the REFLECTIONS CD (Reflections of Love) was translated to (Spiegel der Liebe) and re-recorded by SALZBURGER ECHO, in Salt Lake City, Utah.
1999: a solo piano CD: (Audiosphere), PRELUDES AND REVERIES, modern and New Age piano,
1999: REFLECTIONS (Classical solo piano, 21 tunes)(Audiosphere). REVIEW (Jazz Escapades CD): Mellow and sparkling! Reviewer: Kathy Parsons I have reviewed several of Clayton Wright’s solo piano albums in the past, but this is the first one with his trio. “Jazz Escapades” sparkles with the joy of making music and interacting with like-minded musicians. Wright helms the Trio at the piano, and is joined by Mark Miley on drums and Billy Brockmann on bass. The music creates the ambiance of a jazz lounge where the mood is easy and upbeat. The Trio melds improvisation with composition, and all of the pieces are smooth and mellow, drawing from bebop, cool, and traditional jazz stylings. Wright composed all of the music, and, to these ears, this is by far his best album to date. Quite a few of the songs have been on Wright’s solo piano albums, but the Trio breathes new life into them and makes them really shine. Although the mood is fairly consistent from start to finish, the pieces are distinctive, making this CD easy on the ears in the background or with full concentration. The CD opens with “Ultracool Cats,” a piece that is a bit aloof and yet playful, setting the tone for the album. “Nightlife” is one of my favorites - cool, silky, and graceful - what a great tune for a slow dance! I really like “Mirage,” too. On the dark side, it hides a mysterious secret as it teases and tantalizes. “The Humble Bumblebee” is as easy-going as they come as it moseys from flower to flower without a care in the world. “Afterglow” is a bit more reflective and thoughtful. “Momentum” is more energetic, but remains in the cool and breezy groove. “Driftwood” floats freely on a cloud of sea foam, in no rush to go anywhere. I really enjoyed reviewing “Jazz Escapades” and look forward to hearing what else the Clayton Wright Trio comes up with. Recommended for fans of mellow jazz. This album is amazingly interesting, sort of intellectually inspiring, and fun.


Review of Nightlife (Jazz Escapades) by Shouldergreye,
Syracuse, (expired link).

Great soundtrack music
great piano playing, it's got soul in it. The
melody is stimulating, doesn't get off track
or get boring. the mood of nostalgia and
better days is successfully kept throughout
the song. Would be perfect in a movie
soundtrack, opening credits music while
we're looking at panoramic new york in the fall.


- sholdergreye
Syracuse, New York
Reviews of Nightlife by Clayton Wright Jazz Piano Trio


Review of Nightlife (Jazz Escapades) by Charlie North
Lima, Ohio

Tinkle The Keys!
Very warm and rich piano song! The mood
is wonderful ala some of Bruce Hornsby
compositions. Nice change of pace to sit
back and listen to and I listened twice cause
I didn't want the mood to end. I usually sing
off keep rockin but to you just...thanks!
CharlieNorth
Entertainment or Jazz Dance Ensemble

Listen Free at:
(expired link)
http:(expired link)

Clayton Wright Jazz Piano Trio plays traditional jazz and jazz-rock music, for entertainment or for jazz-dance ensemble. Listen free at: (expired link)
and
(expired link)
The albums by Clayton Wright usually consists of piano, bass and drums but sometimes uses other instruments including Yamaha Motif 8-88.