Oregon
Biography Oregon
Ralph Towner
was born in Washington state in 1940, moved to Oregon at age five and grew up there. He began to improvise at the piano at age four, imitating recordings from the WW II era. His mother was a piano teacher and church organist, and each member of the family played one or several musical instruments well. Brass, string and woodwind groups were all represented in the family orchestra. Ralph began formal study on trumpet, and began playing in Dixieland, swing and polka bands at age seven, and became the youngest member to ever perform in the municipal band of Bend, Oregon. He studied classical composition at the University of Oregon, graduated in 1963 and went to Vienna, Austria to study classical guitar, an instrument he discovered in his fourth year of university. He studied one year under the renowned Professor Karl Scheit, returned to the University of Oregon for graduate work in composition with Professor Homer Keller, then returned for a second year of study in Vienna with Professor Scheit. He subsequently moved to New York City in 1968 to continue his career as guitarist-pianist-composer in earnest. In 1980 he added the keyboard synthesizers to his instrumental arsenal.
Since 1970 he has recorded over forty albums under his own name and has collaborated in concert and/or recording with OREGON, Keith Jarrett, Weather Report (Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter), Egberto Gismonti, Gary Burton, John Abercrombie, Gary Peacock, Jack DeJohnette, Jan Hammer, Eddie Gomez, Elvin Jones, Freddie Hubbard, Michel Portal, Dave Holland, Paul Winter Consort, and many others. He has won numerous awards, including: two German Grammy Awards (Deutscher Schallplatten Preis) for the best jazz recording of 1976 world-wide, (Solstice, with Jan Garbarek, Eberhard Weber and Jon Christenson), and again in 1988 for Ecotopia with OREGON (Paul McCandless, Glen Moore, Trilok Gurtu); the Downbeat magazine poll for acoustic guitar and the New York Jazz Award as best New York City acoustic guitarist. He has performed in concerts world-wide in Asia, Africa, South America, Eastern and Western Europe, Australia and New Zealand, Japan, Mexico and North America; in jazz clubs and major concert halls such as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Berlin Philharmonic Hall, and Vienna’s Mozartsaal.
Towner has recorded over one hundred-fifty of his instrumental compositions.
His works for orchestra have been performed by the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Stuttgart Opera Orchestra, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Indianapolis Symphony, the Freiburg Festival Orchestra and the Stavanger Chamber Orchestra of Norway. He has been commissioned to compose large orchestral works by the Cabrillo Festival Orchestra, where he was composer-in-residence, and by the AT&T-Rockefeller Foundation. His film scores include Un Altra Vita by Carlo Mazzacurati as well as numerous documentary films. He has composed music for L’ Isola Incandescente, a play adapted from the writings of Vincenzo Consolo, and incidental music for Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. His compositions have been used by numerous dance choreographers including Alvin Ailey, Pilobolus, and Murray Louis. He was honored by Apollo astronauts, who carried his music on cassette to the moon and officially named two moon craters after two of his compositions.
Oregon ~ Live At Yoshi’s, ANTHEM, a guitar solo recording for ECM, and Oregon In Moscow, a double CD of symphony orchestra music (ten compositions by Towner for OREGON and orchestra) recorded with the Moscow Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra in Moscow. “The Templars”, the fourth track on disc 1 of this album, received a 2001 Grammy nomiantion for Best Instrumental Compostion.
Paul McCandless
During a distinguished career spanning three decades, Paul McCandless has brought a soaring lyricism to his playing and composing that has been integral to the ensemble sound of two seminal world music bands, the Paul Winter Consort and the relentlessly innovative quartet, OREGON. A gifted multi-instrumentalist and composer, McCandless has specialized in a broad palette of both single and double reed instruments that reflect his grounding in both classical and jazz disciplines.
Born in the small town of Indiana, Pennsylvania to a musical family, McCandless inherited his artistic passion from his parents who were both music teachers.His father played the oboe, as well as his grandfather, who acquainted Paul in his youth with the world of musical instruments in his repair shop, where pieces of old horns became toys. By nine, McCandless was playing the clarinet. Although his training was classical, he was introduced to jazz during junior high school and was learning saxophone at the same time that he took up his primary instrument, oboe.
As he continued his studies at Duquesne University and the Manhattan School of Music, McCandless embarked on his performing career playing with the Pittsburgh Symphony at Carnegie Hall and the United Nations when he was only 19.
At the recommendation of his oboe teacher, Robert Bloom, Toscanini’s first oboe player, he joined the Paul Winter Consort. A finalist in the 1971 English horn auditions for the New York Philharmonic, McCandless had already been playing with the Consort for three years, establishing an affinity for unconventional contemporary chamber settings. He would play with them until 1973, recording five albums and appearing at Fillmores East and West, the Tanglewood and Schaeffer Festivals and numerous colleges throughout the U.S.
While he was a member of the Consort, McCandless formed an alliance with guitarist/pianist Ralph Towner, bassist Glen Moore and percussionist Collin Walcott to later form the group OREGON. For three decades, this group has continued—transcending all established genres; surviving the tragic death of Collin Walcott (succeeded now by Mark Walker); recording 23 albums on Vanguard, Elektra/Asylum, ECM, Epic, Chesky and Intuition Records; performing in major clubs and concert halls including Carnegie Hall three times, Lincoln Center, Berlin Philharmonic Hall, and Vienna’s Mozartsaal; touring the U.S, Canada, Mexico, South America, Eastern and Western Europe, North Africa, the Indian subcontinent, and Australia; appearing at international festivals in Berlin, Pori, Molde, Newport, Telluride, Arcosanti, Bombay and Delhi. As a member of OREGON, he has been a featured soloist and composer with the Stavanger Orchestra, and in conjunction with Dennis Russell Davies performed with the Philadelphia, St. Paul Chamber, Stuttgart Opera, and Freiburg orchestras.
In 1999, Paul recorded three of his orchestral scores for OREGON and the Moscow Tchaikovsky Orchestra called Oregon In Moscow.
In his odyssey through the woodwind family, McCandless gradually expanded his array of instruments, adding the bass clarinet, soprano and sopranino saxophones, penny whistles, various ethnic flutes, and the electronic wind controller to his primary instruments, the oboe and English horn.
He began extending his reach outside of OREGON as a collaborator and solo artist, and is credited with more than 150 albums and performances with such musicians as Jaco Pastorius (Invitation on Warner Brothers), Carla Bley (Night-Glo on Watt-Works), Art Lande/Dave Samuels (Skylight on ECM), Eberhard Weber (Later That Evening on ECM), as well as with Wynton Marsalis, Pat Metheny, Mark Isham, Steve Reich, Al Jarreau, Bruce Hornsby, Victor Wooten, Fred Simon, Michael Manring, Darol Anger, Mike Marshall, and String Cheese Incident.
He inaugurated his solo career with All the Mornings Bring on Elektra/Asylum and Navigator on Landslide. The desire to work with larger compositional forms led to his 1988 release Heresay on Windham Hill featuring pianist Art Lande and Pat Metheny Group bassist Steve Rodby, followed by Premonition in 1992 with renowned players: Metheny Group pianist Lyle Mays, Steve Rodby both as producer and player, former Yellowjackets drummer William Kennedy and OREGON drummer Mark Walker. He toured with his own quintet featuring Mays and Rodby in the U.S. and Canada where he performed at the Montreal Jazz Festival.
While an artist on Windham Hill, McCandless also contributed to numerous anthologies including Bach Variations, The Impressionists, The Romantics, and Solstices II-VI, two of which were gold records. He also composed and recorded Squanto and the First Thanksgiving for Rabbit Ears Productions which was aired on Mel Gibson’s children’s program on National Public Radio. In 1997 he wrote, scored and performed four symphonic compositions with the Camerata Orchestra in Mexico City
Even as McCandless pursues his solo endeavors and his work with OREGON, he keeps several other activities in motion simultaneously. He recorded three albums and toured with Béla Fleck with whom he won a Grammy in 1996 for Best Pop Instrumental. He maintains his long-standing musical relationship with Art Lande, continues to collaborate with a multitude of other artists and currently tours with the group Proteus 7.
Paolino Dalla Porta
Bass player, composer, he studied classical guitar, acoustic bass and contemporary composition.
Paolino Dalla Porta is considered one of the most interesting and eclectic bassists of the Italian and European jazz scene. Since its inception in the late 70’s, he has always tried to combine various musical languages that merged improvised and creative music, Mediterranean and ethnic traditions and Jazz.
In over thirty years he has been the promoter and collaborator of many groups that thanks to the research of music and original languages have contributed to the creation of what was defined as a real current of Italian and European Jazz: Nexus, Democratic Orchestra Milano, Stefano Battaglia Trio, Enrico Rava 4tet, Maurizio Giammarco Trio, Elena Ledda, Antonello Salis 5tet, Grande Orchestra Nazionale, Bebo Ferra – Paolino Dalla Porta Duo, Gianluca Petrella Indigo 4tet, Paolo Fresu Devil 4tet, Tino Tracanna Acrobats 5tet, Giovanni Falzone Special Band etc.
Since 1978 he has been playing and recording with many prestigious European and American musicians, among which: Pat Metheny, Dave Liebman, Lester Bowie, Sam Rivers, Aldo Romano, Tony Oxley, Paul Bley, Kenny Wheeler, Mick Goodrick, Adam Nussbaum , Lee Konitz, Paul McCandless, Michel Pertucciani, Billy Cobham, Mal Waldrom, Leroy Jenkins, Glenn Ferris, Massimo Urbani, Don Cherry, Oliver Lake, Franco D’Andrea, Ran Blake, Jimmy Owens, Daniel Humair, Don Moye, Manfred Schoof, Roberto Gatto, Misha Mangelberg, Han Bennik, Bill Elgart, Richard Galliano, Francis Bebey, Dominique Pifarely, Claudio Fasoli, Kurt Rosenwinkel, David Murray, Dave Burrel, Sainkho Namtchylak, John Taylor, Eliot Zigmund, Roswell Rudd, Norma Winstone, Dave Binney, Nelson Veras, John Tchicai, Bill Stewart, Mark Turner, George Garzone, Uri Caine, Bill Carrothers, Steven Bernstein, Jeff Ballard, Avishai Cohen, Jorge Rossi, John Abercrombie, Don Byron, Nir Felder and others.
Tours in all Europe, United States, Australia, New Caledonie, French Polinesia, Argentina, Africa, China and Colombia.
International Jazz festivals: Chicago, Melbourne, Atlanta, Umbria Jazz, North Sea Jazz Fest, Marciac, Pisa, Grenoble, Wien, Koln, Zurich, Rive de Geres, Le Mans, Cagliari, Montpellier, Clusone, Maastricht, Ravenna, Calvì, Genova, Nevers, Trento, Maribor, Arnhem, Verona, Bolzano, Chur, Zagreb, Hamburg, Vicenza, Milano, Skopje, Paris, Venice, Porquerolles, Boulogne S.M., Berchidda, Roccella Jonica, Vitrolles, Glasgow, Womex-Berlin, Buenos Aires, Bogotà, Montevideo, Jerusalem, Gent, Coutances, Roma, Leverkusen, Guimaraes, Beograd, Bucarest and many others.
Paolino has recorded about 150 records among which six as leader and twenty as co-author. In 1994, his record “Tales” with Kenny Wheeler was awarded four stars by the prestigious American jazz magazine “Down Beat”.
He also composed the sound tracks of the movie “Domenica”, directed by Wilma Labate, the music for the docu-movie “Inge” by Luca Scarzella and the music for “Magia d’Africa” by Achille Mauri, a tv documentary .
He has been teaching Master Classes at Siena Jazz Summer Workshop since 1999. He is a Bass Professor since 2006 at the Jazz Department of Milano Conservatorio and at the Piacenza Conservatorio since 2014.
Currently he is member of the Bands: Oregon, Paolo Fresu (Devil Quartet – Kind of Porgy & Bess Sextet), Zlatko Kaucic Trio, Tino Tracanna Acrobats Quintet, Duo & Trio with Bebo Ferra, Duo with Giovanni Falzone, Dino Rubino Trio and he is a leader of different projects (solo, trio, quartet, quintet).
He has been elected Best Italian Bass Player in 2008 in the magazine InSound and also in the Top Jazz 2009 by the magazine Musica Jazz.
Mark Walker
(b 1961 Chicago, IL) is one of the most versatile and musical drummers, composers and educators in the business. His long-standing relationships with artists such as Paquito D’Rivera (25 years) and the group Oregon (18 years) show his commitment to creating the music of the highest quality. He has played on over 60 albums, including five Grammy winning and nine Grammy nominated projects.
Walker has toured extensively and recorded with Lyle Mays, Michel Camilo, Eliane Elias, Cesar Camargo Mariano, Patricia Barber, the WDR Big Band, the Caribbean Jazz Project, Grace Kelly, Linda Eder, and Andy Narell, and has also performed live with Rosa Passos, Michael Brecker, Toninho Horta, Chucho Valdes, Filo Machado, Dianne Reeves, Regina Carter, James Ingram, Joao Bosco, and Leny Andrade. He appears in the Latin Jazz documentary “Calle 54”(Miramax) with Paquito D’Rivera and Dave Samuels.
As a composer, he was a recipient of a Grammy nomination for his composition “Deep Six”, which appeared on the group Oregon’s Grammy nominated recording “1000 Kilometers.” He also wrote “What About That!” for the Paquito D’Rivera Quintet’s Grammy Award winning CD “Funk Tango.”
Walker is currently completing a solo album with a 9-piece ensemble, entitled “The Rhythm of the Americas Project”, featuring his original modern jazz compositions in various Latin American styles.
As an educator, he was awarded the rank of Professor at Berklee College of Music, where he has taught since 2001, developing courses in South American and Caribbean rhythms. He is currently offering an independent online drum set course by subscription at www.markwalkerlessons.com. He is also the author of the instructional drum set book and CD “World Jazz Drumming” (Berklee Press/Hal Leonard).
