FILMORE STREET LITTLE WOODSTAR

Take a foundation of classical composition, add a whole lot of jazz influence, and sprinkle in some Bob Dylan and Grateful Dead and you get FILLMORE STREET/LITTLE WOODSTAR, a walloping one-two punch of works for jazz and studio orchestra by composer Sasha Matson.

The titular Little Woodstar incorporates a vocal quintet in a lush, progressive journey that keeps ears perked and ready for the next thing. The texts refer to names of species included in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Animals. The record is rounded out with Fillmore Street, where Matson walks us through three of his most meaningful California locales with an upbeat energy that conjures feet slapping pavement and rubber hitting the road. Adding to the album’s zest are the rooms where it was recorded: the legendary Sear Sound studio in Manhattan and East/West Studios in Hollywood with seasoned producers Joe Harley and John Atkinson.

Sasha Matson and I go back many years, back to the early 1990s when I first became aware of his music. Matson has always been tough to pigeonhole. He gets pegged as a classical composer/arranger and he is, indeed, that. (The man studied with John Adams among several other notables.) But, coming of age in Berkeley CA as he did, he also has a keen appreciation of the San Francisco music scene, especially the Grateful Dead. Stir in equal parts Bob Dylan and many jazz influences, and the word eclectic doesn’t fully capture his musical essence. You can hear this from the first project we worked on together, I5/Steel Chords, and you can hear it now with this release of FILLMORE STREET/LITTLE WOODSTAR.

On October 21, 2023, Matson gathered a group of Los Angeles’ finest musicians in Hollywood’s legendary East/West Studio 1 (In prior incarnations, this studio was known variously as Cello, OceanWay, and Western). Joining us in the control room was engineer Steve Genewick, whose credits are vast and who worked alongside engineering legend Al Schmidt for over 20 years.

Our mission was to record the instrumental tracks for Matson’s two-part piece, Little Woodstar. I had heard synth versions of this music prior to the session, but it was truly a thrill to hear these marvelous compositions come to vibrant life with world-class musicians. It was even a larger thrill to hear the fully realized final version with vocalists added in the later sessions in New York City.

As always, Matson takes you on a journey… a voyage full of beauty, heartbreak, and promise. Immerse yourselves.

– Joe Harley

Co-Producer Joe Harley has had a long career in music, producing for a variety of labels over the last 30+ years. Currently, Harley is Director of Catalog and A&R Marketing for Blue Note Records, in addition to managing Blue Note’s Tone Poet reissue series.

Having produced three albums of Matson’s music — Cooperstown, Tight Lines, and Molto Molto — I have long been impressed by his ability to compose musically complex works that are nevertheless emotionally communicative. It was a pleasure, therefore, to be asked to co-produce his latest album. It was an even greater pleasure to be able to work with a talented young vocal quintet led by soprano Aubrey Johnson and some of New York’s greatest jazz musicians, including Andy Farber on winds, Adam Birnbaum on piano, Melissa Slocum on bass, and Alvester Garnett on drums. Add to that the opportunity to work with legendary engineers Chris Allen and James Farber in the hallowed hall of Manhattan’s Sear Sound Studio, and you will understand why I spent the three days of sessions wearing a large smile.

– John Atkinson

Co-Producer John Atkinson has been Editor and now Technical Editor for Stereophile magazine since 1986. A musician, primarily on bass guitar, a sound recordist, and an audiophile, Atkinson has produced, engineered, mastered, or played instruments, on more than 40 commercially released LPs and CDs since 1972, including Matson’s Cooperstown, Tight Lines, and Molto Molto recordings.

TRACK LISTING
#	Title	Time
01	Fillmore Street	6:21
02	Sonora Pass	7:00
03	Mar Vista	5:16
04	Little Woodstar I	10:20
05	Little Woodstar II	12:19

 

Fillmore Street

Fillmore Street is a recently composed instrumental composition scored for a Jazz Orchestra of 16 players. In three movements, the programmatic titles refer to three locations in California that have meant much to me over the years. In the early 1980s we lived at 2411 Fillmore Street in San Francisco, and the first movement, “Fillmore Street,” refers to that time.

At 4:53 I quote from several musical works that were in my ears then — including the sound of a disco hi-hat. “Sonora Pass” refers to the highway that traverses the Sierra Nevada mountains north of Yosemite, one of the most beautiful and varied landscapes in the world. The third movem

ent, titled “Mar Vista,” recalls the neighborhood we lived in, south of Santa Monica and east of Venice, in the great City and County of Los Angeles.

Recording again in New York, with the greatest jazz musicians — a high point for any composer. Sear Sound — at this time — was the longest-running studio in Manhattan. One plus was being able to use studio founder Walter Sear’s original 1968 Moog Model IIIC modular synthesizer, one of the first made. Walter Sear and Robert Moog were friends and business associates.

Little Woodstar

Little Woodstar was composed in the mid-1990s, while I was studying at UCLA. I scored it for a Vocal Quintet and Large Orchestra, and now have re-orchestrated for a smaller Studio Orchestra of 16 players and five singers. It is a pleasure to hear it well-recorded and beautifully performed by the best musicians in Los Angeles. The term “Studio Orchestra” was often used when I first lived in Los Angeles, to refer to groups of about 20 to 30 players utilized for film and television scoring. I like the intimacy of one-on-a-part groupings. We recorded the ensemble in Los Angeles, in the superb large Studio 1 at East/West Studios in Hollywood. Vocals were recorded at Sear Sound in New York.
Established in 1964, The International Union for Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Animals has evolved to become the world’s most comprehensive source on the global conservation status of animal, fungi, and plant species. Little Woodstar is the common vernacular name for one species of Hummingbird, among over 150,000 species currently assessed for the Red List. Struck by the poetic beauty of the names, a selection of 47 of them became the text for this work. The texts are used by permission.

– Sasha Matson

Fillmore Street

 

Recorded May and April 2024 at Sear Sound in New York NYSession Engineer & Mixing James FarberMoog Programming Owen Mulholland

 

Little Woodstar

Orchestra recorded October 2023 at East/West Studios in Hollywood CAVocals recorded January 2024 at Sear Sound in New York NYSession Engineers Steve Genewick, Chris AllenMixing Chris Allen   Producers John Atkinson, Joe Harley   Vinyl Mastering Matt LutthansDigital Mastering John AtkinsonContracting Peter Kent, Aubrey Johnson, Andy Farber Cover Photography Anthony Lujan, Mark MillerGraphic Design Ian Lascell

In Memory of Amy Shulman Kent.