Freddie Bryant’s latest recording project is his most intimate and his first complete album of solo guitar. Solo Bossa features 14 of his original compositions written over the last four decades. The title refers to bossa nova and many of the tracks have that classic feel made famous in the early 1960’s. The music takes the journey from bossa to samba as well as baiao, bolero, waltz and a sultry ballad-bossa in 7/4.

Solo Bossa was preceded by Upper West Side Love Story an epic song cycle featuring a nonet fronted by the acclaimed jazz singer, Carla Cook. It’s a double CD/90min with sixteen songs with his “passionate lyrics and colorful music.” (Carlo Wolff/Downbeat). It was featured in the NY Daily News and Downbeat listed it as “Best CDs of 2023.”  The all-star cast also includes Regina Carter on violin and saxophonists Donny McCaslin and Steve Wilson along with strings and a stellar rhythm section. Visit the website: https://upperwestsidelovestory.com/ for more info.

Freddie received a master’s degree in classical guitar from Yale School of Music and is in demand in the New York jazz and Brazilian scenes where he has worked with Eliane Elias, Tom Harrell and many others. He was a member of Ben Riley’s Monk Legacy Septet and has played with the Mingus Orchestra for two decades. He leads his own group, Kaleidoscope, and has released ten CDs as a leader. His impressive array of guitar styles have been featured on numerous CDs showcasing his work on acoustic and electric guitars.

His touring has brought him to 55 countries where he collaborated with musicians from a variety of backgrounds, including Indian classical musicians, African singers, oud players, traditional Arab groups and klezmer bands. In 2006, Bryant spent a week in Cuba, performing solo and working with other Cuban musicians. As an impassioned educator, he has taught jazz to all ages around the world and is on the faculties of Berklee College of Music in Boston and Prins Claus Conservatory in Groningen, Holland. 2017 saw the World premiere at the London Human Rights Watch Film Festival of Complicit with his music score. 

His other eight CDs include: Monk Restrung, celebrating the music of Thelonious Monk, Dreamscape: Solo, Duo, Trio featuring Chris Potter and Scott Colley, Live Grooves…Epic Tales with his band Kaleidoscope including Donny McCaslin and Yosvany Terry, Brazilian Rosewood, Boogaloo Brasileiro, Live at Smoke with Steve Wilson, Chris Cheek, Diego Urcola, Edward Simon, Edsel Gomez, Avishai Cohen and Jordi Rossy, Take Your Dance into Battle with Don Braden, Ira Coleman and Billy Drummond as well as Trio del Sol co-led with Misha Piatigorsky and Gilad. 

Look for the release of these singles before the CD drops on July 7th!

Kid’z Rhymes – April 20

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Cover photo by Warren B. Lee

We Used to Dance – May 11

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His Bed is a Box – May 25

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Roses and Rubies – June 9

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Love Can’t Live on Nostalgia
June 23

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Central Park Life – June 30
Double CD release:
Upper West Side Love Story
July 7

See the page above for more info on the piece
or click here: UWS LOVE STORY

In 2016 his CD Monk Restrung was released featuring the compositions of Thelonious Monk with Freddie’s trio of guitar, bass and drums with guest appearances of three of the finest guitarists in jazz: Howard Alden, Peter Bernstein and Romero Lubambo.

2014 marked the release of Bryant’s seventh CD, Dreamscape: Solo, Duo, Trio which features the stellar cast of Chris Potter – reeds and Scott Colley – bass as well as the leader playing four guitars: Telecaster, Jazz arch-top, classical and 12-string. Jazz writer Bill Milkowski wrote: “Imbued with Bryant’s inimitable touch, inherent soulfulness and the element of surprise, Dreamscape: Solo-Duo-Trio is also marked by the guitarist’s ability to seamlessly traverse the classical-jazz divide on this collection of jazz standards and compelling originals.”

Freddie has also had the honor of touring with three legends of the music world: African singer, Salif Keita, the virtuoso klezmer clarinetist, maestro Giora Feidman and the jazz trumpet great, Tom Harrell (as a member of his quintet, 1999-2001).  He has recorded and/or played with D.D. Jackson, Steve Wilson, Kevin Hays, Brad Mehldau, Chris Potter, bassist Avishai Cohen, Rosanna Vitro, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Sheila Jordan, Randy Brecker, David Sanchez, Joshua Redman, Wynton Marsalis, Max Roach, Lonnie Smith and many others. He is also on the first call list of many singers and Brazilian musicians because of his sensitive accompanying and his knowledge of Brazilian guitar and has toured with pianist/singer Eliane Elias.

Over the years he has toured in 55 countries and has had the opportunity of collaborating with musicians from a wide variety of backgrounds including the Indian sitarist, Shubhendra Rao, the Kenyan singers, Achien’g Abura, Suzanna Owiyo, the Taarab master oud player Zein L’abdin and traditional groups in Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E.  In 2006 he performed in Cuba as a solo artist and spent a week of musical exchange with Cuban musicians including the trumpet player, “El Greco” formerly of Irakere.  He has toured as a cultural ambassador for The U.S. Department of State numerous times and performed at the Kennedy Center with the Billy Taylor Trio appearing on National Public Radio Show, “Live at the Kennedy Center.”

His previous CDs as a leader include: Live Grooves…Epic Tales (HiPNOTIC), Brazilian Rosewood, Boogaloo Brasileiro, Live at Smoke (Fresh Sound Records) and Take Your Dance into Battle (Jazz City Spirit). He has two group-titled CDs with collaborative groups: Trio del Sol with Misha Piatogorsky and Gilad and Dharma Jazz with Lewis Porter, Badal Roy and Karttikeya.

Education has always been a large part of his musical life.  He received his BA from Amherst College, ’87 and Master’s degree in classical guitar from the Yale School of Music, ’94. He has taught all ages from young children to university students and has lectured about jazz to audiences around the world.  In 2004 he was chosen to be a Copeland Fellow at Amherst after which he was a visiting lecturer at Williams College in Africana Studies and Music from 2006-2011.

Bryant is on the faculties of Berklee College of Music and Prince Claus Conservatory in Groningen, Holland. 2017 saw the world premier at the London Human Rights Watch Film Festival of Complicit with his music score. He is a recipient of the CMA New Jazz Works Composition Grant, 2019 and the resulting piece will be an epic work for 9 piece jazz ensemble, singer and children’s chorus to be premiered in 2020 featuring an all-star cast of Regina Carter, Donny McCaslin, Steve Wilson, Akua Dixon, Gwen Laster and vocalist, Carla Cook.

Freddie has also been incorporating his practice of taiji (tai chi) and qigong into his teaching in workshops around the world (Holland, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Vermont and Massachusetts).

“Guitarist Freddie Bryant is a rhythmic and melodic sponge. Put him in any musical situation, be it classical, jazz, funk, Senegalese, etc., and he’ll tend to become one with the music.” — Jason Koransky, www.downbeatjazz.com