‘Cloud Nine’ Is my upcoming CD release, coming out on Posi-tone Records late June 2012.

The record features myself on alto saxophone and compositions, Adam Rogers on guitar, Matt Wilson on drums and Sam Yahel on organ. The material selected for the record consists of 6 new original tunes and 2 arrangements, one of a Finnish hymn and another of a pretty Jobim tune called Luiza. The band did a solid job with the music and thanks to Posi-tone Records for helping cook up a great record, all modesty aside.

I am doing 3 tours in the second half of this year to promote Cloud Nine.  The first one is in Europe (Finland, Sweden, Germany and France) in late June-early July. Dates are already posted on the performance page.  The second tour is in Australia and New Zealand in August-September.  The third tour is in Europe again in November.  This time Portugal, France, Spain and Germany.  I also hope to hit the west coast in late October early July too for a couple shows

Keep an eye on the performances page if you want to come check us out. Stay tuned for some audio samples of the record in the coming weeks.

January 19th-22nd I am heading to Canada for 4 concerts and 2 mastrclasses.  I will be joined by New York guitarist Adam Rogers and local Canadian/NY talent: drummer Ernesto Cervini and bassist Jim Vivian.  This will be a fun few days with 2 shows at the Rex Hotel in Toronto, a show in Waterloo at the Jazz Room, and in Hamilton at the Pearl Company theater.  Am also doing a clinic at the University of Toronto on Friday the 20th Feb in the day and at Mohawk College in Hamilton on the 19th Feb.  See performances page for more info.

The August 2011 Europe tour for the Jacam Manricks band was a lot of fun and a great success.  The concerts featured Eric McPherson on drums, Gianluca Renzi on bass and Werner Klausnitzer on piano, as well as myself on sax and compositions. We performed to full houses in Helsinki, Stockholm, Oulu, Turku, Munich and Passau.  In Helsinki we played an old castle type concert space/restaurant/bar called Juttutupa, which was apparently where Lenin planned the Russian Revolution in the early 1900s.  We then traveled to Stockholm where we played a great little venue and to an enthusiastic ‘wall to wall’ audience at the Glenn Miller Cafe.  The next night we played a concert in Oulu Finland for the EloJazz Festival.  In addition to the responsive audience there it was great to have a sauna and bar in the band room After Oulu we traveled to the old capital of Finland Turku, which was the European City Capital of Culture for 2011. Consequently the streets where alive throughout the wee small hours of the morning.  We played to a responsive crowd and encountered possibly the most excited single audience member of our careers at a nice little venue called the Monk Jazz Club downtown Turku.  After Turku we traveled to the Austrian/German border for one night at the Cafe Museum in Passau, as part of the Passau Jazz Festival/Series. We wrapped up the tour with a fun concert at the Unterfarht in Munich.  What a great club and audience.  Till next July.

4 Star Review for ‘Trigonometry’ Published in The Australian May 28th 2011

BRISBANE-BORN saxophonist-composer Jacam Manricks, New York-based for the past 10 years, comes from a musical family of Sri Lankan-Portuguese extraction. The first striking thing about Manricks’s NY sextet is the intellectually stimulating quality of his compositions, followed closely by the leader’s pleasing alto tone, ceaseless ideas and advanced technique. This is a tightly interlaced group of respected NY musicians with a front line of Manricks, Scott Wendholt on trumpet and trombonist Alan Ferber. The title track, Trigonometry, like its namesake in maths, explores triangular relationships and angles — in this case in 7/4 time — and features the alto gliding over the rhythm section of Gary Versace on piano, bassist Joe Martin and drummer Obed Calvaire. Cluster Funk is certainly funky, again in 7/4 time, with a soul-infused piano and trumpet lead, moving into a grooving, building, trumpet solo, then a diagonal approach from the alto. The only non-original on the album is Eric Dolphy’s esoteric Miss Ann, which loses none of its impact when Manrick’s purity of tone contrasts with Dolphy’s original raw-edged attack; the hyper-fast, unpredictable Dolphy-style jagged flow is maintained by the alto and Martin’s bass keeps the momentum alive in his solo. Manricks is touring Australia with a quartet that includes a couple of Australian players; details at www.jacammanricks.com.

Review By John McBeath

http://www.theaustralian.com.a​u/news/arts/ths-weeks-music-cd​s/story-e6frg8n6-1226061152050

4 Star Review for Trigonometry Published in The Sydney Morning Herald-Metro July 1st 2011.

http://www.pressdisplay.com/pr​essdisplay/showlink.aspx?bookm​arkid=IGGBGJQ9JJT5&linkid=099f​7072-6eaf-4801-902d-f6711fa1ac​85&pdaffid=1QI8ZVEXU%2By240nWG​hr0lA%3D%3D

Jacam Manricks Quartet Canberra Concert Report by Eric Pozza

http://canberrajazz.blogspot.com/2011/06/unsparing-energy.html

Photos by Brian Stewart

http://jazz.cyberhalides.com/2011/JacamManricksQuartet-UoC-5June2011.html

• July 27th – Jacam Manricks Trio featuring Tyshawn Sorey -drums Tba-bass Trumpets Jazz Club 6 Depot Square Montclair New Jersey
• July 30th – Jacam Manricks Trio La Lanterna ( Macdougal street in the west village NYC)
• August 27th (4pm) Jacam Manricks Trio Smalls Jazz Club  Christopher St West Village

The touring band will feature: Eric McPherson on drums, Gianluca Renzi on bass and Werner Klausnitzer on piano, and myself on saxes and compositions.  Firstly we visit Finland, mainly for the EloJazz Festival in Oulu (Aug 5), but we will be playing concerts in Helsinki at Juttutupa (Aug 3), and in Turku at the Monk Jazz Club (Aug 6) too. We’re doing an overnight stay in Stockholm where we’re playing at the Glenn Miller Cafe (Aug 4). And, we head to Austria to play Cafe Museum in Passau on Aug 7th. We then head to Munich to play the Unterfarht on Aug 8th.  There is also possibly another concert in the making around this time which will be listed in the full itinerary on the performances page shortly.  The music presented will be a mix of originals from my current album Trigonometry and newer material written in the last few months.  We are going to record the Unterfahrt concert with the Bavarian Broadcasting Company, I hope,  and will possibly make a live album with the recording.  Stay tuned for more on that.

Hope to see you at one of the shows.

After having to cancel the original recording session, due to illness nearly a year earlier, the Posi-tone Records recording session for my new album (featuring Adam Rogers-guitar, Sam Yahel-organ and Matt Wilson-drum) finally happened October 19th 2011 in New York. It was a productive period indeed, with my daughter being born a few days before the recording session and the entire album completed in approx 6-7 hours, give or take a break for some okra curry and naan bread.  8 new originals of mine and my arrangements of Jobim, Coltrane and Dolphy compositions were among the material recorded.  Some solo improvisations were also recorded. It was a fantastic experience for me to work with this group of seasoned professionals and masters of their instruments.   They are the some of the best in the biz! The mixing/editing process is soon to commence and the album should be out around May/June 2012.

We had a great (and busy) time touring Australia & New Zealand in May -June 11. We managed to do 24 events, basically in all of 18 days. The band was myself, Jackson Harrison-piano (Sydney), Linda Oh-bass (NY) and Eric McPherson-drums (NY). The tour started in Auckland where we did a concert and workshop at the Auckland University, then played two nights for the Creative Jazz Club. Hadn’t been to NZ before so this was a treat. Our buddy Rog Manins took us to a beautiful remote beach called Whatipu. We then went to Brisbane/ Australia. Did a workshop at the QLD Conservatorium, a schools concert at Marist Bros College Ashgrove and featured at the Valley Jazz Festival. From there we went on to the Gold Coast, where we played at the Gold Coast Arts Center, then on to melbourne for two nights at Bennetts Lane Jazz Club and a bunch of schools concerts/workshops. Off to Sydney from there for more school concerts and clinics, then up north to Darwin where we gave 2 masterclasses at the Charles Darwin University and a concert at the Darwin Entertainment Center. We then came back through Sydney to do a concert for SIMA before heading to Canberra the next day for a concert at the University of Canberra. Then ventured to Adelaide (for the first time), where we played for the COMA jazz series. Briefly stopped over in Melbourne the follwing day for another high school clinic before flying to Hobart where we played a concert at the Tasmanian University Conservatorium. First time performing in Tassy too.

Here’s a link to a video from the Sydney SIMA concert (soon).

Photos from Whatipu New Zealand

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