Artist: Stefano Pastor
Title: Songs
Cat Number: SLAMCD538
Year released: 2012
Format: CD & all digital platforms
Barcode: 5028386053828
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Solo album by Italian violinist Stefano Pastor, winner of “Best Instrumentalist of the Year” (Miscellaneous Category) at Top Jazz 2010 and 2011, the prestigious Italian critics’ poll by Musica Jazz Magazine.
On ‘Songs’ each sound, except for the vocals, comes direct from his violin, with no synthesizers or MIDI equipment used. It’s a work that demonstrates the artistic sensitivity of Pastor, his musical horizons, made of jazz and avant-garde, echoes of European modern music and Brazilian popular songs, with the blues his guiding light throughout.
Stefano Pastor: violin, vocals
“Pastor has the technical sophistication and boundless energy to rearrange the jazz standard of George and Ira Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm” into a an impressive and dense technical tour-de-force…The distortion-laden arrangement of Jimi Hendrix’s “Purple Haze” proves that a violin can follow the legendary guitarist’s exact guitar lines, 45 years after the original performance of the song.” – Eyal Hareuveni, All About Jazz
“Stefano Pastor might be called an expressive mimic. While his primary focus is jazz, he has worked in classical and rock, giving him a broad stylistic knowledge from which to draw, as is evident in his playing on and conception for his CD, Songs…Through much of the CD, Pastor has a warmly sawing tone in the tradition of Stuff Smith and Billy Bang. But playing Jimi Hendrix gives him a chance to put the fiddle to the metal. Forced through a fuzzbox, his violin returns a fantastic sound…Songs is an immensely likeable record.” – Kurt Gottschalk – The Squid’s Ear
Tracks 1 and 2 recorded on January 2010 in Cogoleto, Italy.
Tracks 3, 4, 5 recorded in April, November and December 2010 in Campo Ligure, Italy.
Track 6 recorded in September 2006 in Genova, Italy.
Recorded, mixed and mastered by Stefano Pastor