New Solo Nylon-String Guitar Release From Benji Kaplan Untold Stories

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Following up his 2022 standards outing Something Here Inside ("fresh depths via unusual arrangements, imaginative counterpoint and complex internal voicings" – Howard Mandel, DownBeat), Manhattan-born guitarist Benji Kaplan returns to his primary focus—original compositions—on the absorbing new album Untold Stories. It is Kaplan's seventh album and third solo guitar release, preceded by Something Here Inside and his all-original 2011 debut Meditações no Violão. The first single from Untold Stories, "Xaxado em Alegria, " with accompanying video, highlights Kaplan's marvelous sound and projection on nylon-string acoustic guitar as he brings these passionate, richly melodic pieces to life. The crisp articulation and expressive breadth of Kaplan's playing serves these compositions beautifully, resulting in one of the finest solo guitar outings in recent memory.

"These are stories I always wanted to tell, " Kaplan remarks of Untold Stories, "but I never knew how to put them into words. So here they are on my guitar, in the universal language of music that I always return to when I don't feel understood in my native language, which in my case is English." Among Kaplan's stories are journeys through different landscapes, with references to chaotic New York, the warm and cheerful Northeast of Brazil and the backlands of Minas Gerais and its mysteries, as well as time travel, with references to the past, present and future.

Integral to the sound of Kaplan's music are regional Brazilian idioms such as choro, xaxado, waltz and modinha. Kaplan's frame of reference in a given moment might be the seven-string guitar language of Rio's samba and choro traditions, or Sinatra and Caymmi, or perhaps Rachmaninoff, Debussy and Mahler. Kaplan unites all these influences in a way that expands the parameters of the nylon-string acoustic guitar in jazz.

The title track, for Kaplan, "expresses for me an urgency to burst in to tears in some places, to share a beautiful landscape in others, and in the A section it even implores you to take action. The story may even tell different tales from day to day, change narratives or narrators." The "Xaxado" is inspired "by the free-spirited joy that emanates and glows from my son when he smiles and laughs, explores undiscovered territory and meets new people, " says Kaplan. "Streams, Hill and Forests" has a distinct Egberto Gismonti inspiration, while "An East Side Story" touches on not only Kaplan's East Side NYC upbringing but also those moments in life when he goes "slightly east of my North Star, " taking roundabout paths toward a goal. "Oblivionism, " meanwhile, evokes "a place that has no time or perhaps in a time that has no place. No man's land?"

Then there's the beautiful "Choro de Inconsistência, " of which Kaplan remarks: "The consistency of rhythm and tempo in a song can create a sense of stability and certainty. This song explores some of the uncertainty in life, in music, in art, the imprecision." "Illusion's Waltz" he calls "a melancholic carnival ride on a pinwheel, " "a paradoxical paradise, " a piece that "takes me to the home that can only be found in my head." "Stride and True" is of course a play on words, with certain references to stride piano and "an unconventional melodic rhythmic and harmonic narrative that pushes and pulls you in different directions between worlds of the past and the future." Closing with "The Vigilante, " Kaplan muses on what he calls a "grey area" in the art of writing music: "Certain songs can create peace and calm in some, while causing disquiet and even harm to others. Can a composer be a vigilante of sorts? Perhaps yes."

In addition to his solo guitar work, Kaplan has given us the radically fresh, ambitious Brazilian chamber ensemble settings of Benji & Rita (with Rita Figueiredo), Uai Sô and Chorando Sete Cores, as well as the resplendent guitar-and-flute duo music of Reveries Em Som, featuring Anne Drummond. Born to a Cuban father of Russian Jewish descent and an Austrian Jewish mother, Kaplan has found a way to combine "New York, Central European, Latino and Brazilian cultures, resulting in a rich blend of sounds and colors, " according to François Becquart of Music in Belgium. The deeply informed Brazilian focus of his original output to date has won him recognition as "a true ambassador of Brazilian music in New York" (Canal Musical).

ABOUT BENJI KAPLAN

An award-winning guitarist, composer, arranger, multi-lingual vocalist and educator, Benji Kaplan has performed in venues alongside world-renowned artists such as Junior Mance, Bernard Purdie, Earth Wind & Fire, Seu Jorge and Kassin. The son of a percussionist father and a visual artist mother, Kaplan made multiple excursions to Brazil as a teenager and an adult, and he offers a unique look at jazz and classical music informed by his vast musical experiences performing, writing, studying and playing with master Brazilian composers/performers since the age of 18. Guinga, the most recognized composer from Brazil after Jobim, has stated: "I think he is the greatest composer of Brazilian music to come from the United States... He is a genius." Although Kaplan's compositions are deeply informed harmonically, melodically and linguistically by Brazilian popular music and its vast stories, folklore and rhythms, he is also heavily influenced by music from the Middle East, Argentina, Cuba and Africa (notably Mali and Madagascar). From the full gamut of his musical understanding, he expresses his unique vision with ensembles ranging from string quartets to wind ensembles of varying shapes and sizes.

Artist: BENJI KAPLAN
Title: UNTOLD STORIES
Artist Website: www.benjikaplan.com
Release Date: May 1, 2024
Label: Independent
UPC Code: 95269293468

Benji Kaplan - Guitar

TRACK LISTING

1. Untold Stories 4:01
2. Xaxado em Alegria 2:39
3. Oblivionism 3:52
4. Streams, hills and forests 1:50
5. An east side story 2:37
6. Choro de inconsistência 3:03
7. Illusion's Waltz 3:30
8. Stride and True 3:27
9. The Vigilante 3:43

All songs composed, arranged andproduced by Benji Kaplan

Recorded in Rhinebeck, NY andWoodstock, NY between July and Oct. 2023. Mixed and mastered byHomero Lotito in São Paulo, Brazil.

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