“The accordion isn’t exactly one of the more common instruments in jazz. Yet in the context of the genre-shifting mix of New York’s Claudia Quintet, the accordion sounded so natural at REDCAT on Wednesday night that it’s fair to start questioning just why it doesn’t make an appearance more often… Ted Reichman was seated at the center of the stage, and his accordion often led the group but rarely drifted into a conventional, Eastern European sort of sound…” -Chris Barton, Los Angeles Times, 10/30/09
Chris Speed – clarinet, tenor saxophone
Ted Reichman – accordion
Matt Moran – vibraphone
Drew Gress – bass
John Hollenbeck – percussion, compositions
Auxiliary Claudias:
Theo Bleckmann – voice
Matt Mitchell – piano
The Claudia Quintet is the band I perform with the most and indeed is my longest-running project. I started working with John Hollenbeck in 1995 in a trio called Refuseniks. After the third member of the trio, Reuben Radding, left the band in 1997, John formed the Claudia Quintet. Since then we’ve made six albums and toured extremely widely- from Alabama to the Amazon. Today, Hollenbeck is one of the preeminent composers of our generation, nominated for two Grammy awards for his Large Ensemble, and influencing a new generation of creative musicians.