More
than 20 years in the making, the soul-jazz trumpeter’s fifth album, due
October 28, features Earl Klugh, Jeff Lorber, Jeff Bradshaw, Elan
Trotman and Eric Essix.
Sommerville’s
forte is serving as an impresario of fun and funky frolics and pretty
harmonies that touch the heart. He wrote or co-wrote nine of the disc’s
ten tracks and produced the entire session sharing production duties on
two cuts with fusion icon Jeff Lorber. Like a ringmaster who
skillfully unifies the eclectic acts of a three-ring circus, the
trumpeter who also plays flugelhorn, piano, keyboards, synth bass and
drum programming on the record has scripted a colorful collection of
short stories with his horn serving as the common thread binding
gripping chapters in contemporary and straight-ahead jazz, R&B, hip
hop and rock.
“In
this era of singles downloads, I still believe in the concept of albums
and a cohesive body of music,” said the Atlanta, Georgia-based
Sommerville, who will perform at an album launch gig there on October 30
at the Suite Food Lounge.
“I’ve always wanted to record these songs and I really like them, but
they didn’t fit on previous projects. They were all inspired by real
life experiences thus they have meaning. The long journey that is a
music career is a marathon, not a sprint, and the timing finally came
around for these songs to be recorded for the first time. Surprisingly,
they fit together despite being written over a long period of time and
the variety in their sound and style.”
Sommerville’s trumpet seduces on the sensuous “Desire” highlighted by gossamer guitar from legend Earl Klugh. Venturing in a divergent tangent, Sommerville tosses a bone to Jeff Bradshaw on a raucous and imaginative take on “Caravan,” a scintillating thrill ride that Duke Ellington
never would have seen coming. “Red Cups Up” is a playful party anthem
while Sommerville surprises when he steps to the mic on the stunner “I
Just Wanna Be With You” on which his husky voice quivers and cracks with
raw emotion while crooning an autobiographic story of romance to his
wife. A spiraling Lorber groove, “The Next Big Thing” is a tightly-wound
R&B-jazz-funk mélange illumined by Sommerville’s trumpet and quirky
synth along with a touch of sax from Elan Trotman. The elegiac
“Rebecca of Birmingham” was penned years ago after Sommerville’s
grandmother passed and is graced by a stirring blues-jazz guitar eulogy
from Eric Essix. “Karma” induces reflection during the
straight-ahead jazz exercise after which Sommerville closes the album
with the throwback R&B instrumental “Forever” followed by the
boisterous “The Passport Life.”
A spotlight soloist on the Grammy-nominated and Juno Award-winning album “Alegria” by Cirque du Soleil, Sommerville’s 2007 release “Like You Mean It” won the American Society of Young Musician’s All That Jazz Award in 2009. His trumpet artistry was featured on Hidden Beach Recordings’ “Unwrapped Volume 4” and he’s written and produced a Top 20 single for Bob Baldwin and an album by Rhonda Smith that features performances by Prince, Sheila E. and gospel icon Fred Hammond.
Sommerville is a high-octane performer who is a regular at festivals
and on music cruises. Outside of music, he can be heard voicing spots
for BMW, Coke, Ford, the U.S. Army and more. Additional information can be found at www.JoeySommerville.com.
The songs contained on the “Overnight Sensation” album are:
“Overnight Sensation”
“Desire”
“Caravan”
“Red Cups Up”
“I Just Wanna Be With You”
“The Next Big Thing”
“Rebecca of Birmingham”
“Karma”
“Forever”
“The Passport Life”
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