The Way We Play Marquis Hill

• 1 Welcome / "Bulls Theme" 01:47
• 2 The Way We Play / Minority 06:14
• 3 Prelude 00:37
• 4 Moon Rays 05:33
• 5 My Foolish Heart 04:31
• 6 Polka Dots and Moonbeams 02:05
• 7 Fly Little Bird Fly 05:53
• 8 Maiden Voyage 03:32
• 9 Straight, No Chaser 03:48
• 10 Beep Durple 05:58
• 11 Juan's Interlude 00:36
• 12 Smile 05:22
• Total Runtime 45:56

Info for The Way We Play

For the past five years, 29-year-old trumpeter Marquis Hill has been invigorating the Chicago jazz scene with his sleek approach to modern jazz, which often incorporates elements of spoken word and hip-hop. JazzTimes praised his trumpet playing by stating, “His articulation, precise but unlabored, calls to mind the precedent of Clifford Brown, while his bravura phrasing suggests an equal immersion in Freddie Hubbard and Woody Shaw. All of which surely helped his cause at [the 2014] Thelonious Monk International Jazz Competition, where he won first prize.”

Hill now splits most of his time between his hometown of Chicago and New York City – a decision that provides him a greater pool of jazz talents to help hone his musicianship. With the June 24, 2016 release of The Way We Play, Hill’s debut for Concord Jazz, his profile as a new commanding voice on the jazz landscape will undoubtedly rise.

On The Way We Play, Hill fronts his regular ensemble of four years, the Blacktet, which consists of alto saxophonist Christopher McBride, vibraphonist Justin Thomas, drummer Makaya McCraven, and bassist Joshua Ramos. It’s a smart tactic because it plays to the strengths of Hill as a bandleader and affords the music a vivacious group accord that often comes from years of playing together. Hill, however, flips the scripts on the new disc. Instead of offering entirely original material as he did on his last three discs, he revisits a handful of jazz standards. “I want to pay homage to some of my favorite jazz standards and American songbook classics,” Hill says. “These are some of the songs that I came up playing in various jam sessions; these songs really taught me how to play jazz.”

The Way We Play is hardly a color-by-numbers jazz standards album. As Hill has done on his previous discs, he revitalizes the material by placing heavier emphasis on the groove, which enables the compositions to resonate more to a 21st-century jazz audience – hence the disc’s witty title. “I really want to make it very clear that this is the sound of my band, which is uniquely Chicago. I wanted to put everything on the table – this is the way that we play,” Hill explains.

The Chicago Tribune asserts that the spirit of Chicago is deeply integral to his music by stating, “…his music crystallizes the hard-hitting, hard-swinging spirit of Chicago jazz.” Indeed, Chi-town references burst forward at the very beginning with “Welcome / ‘Bulls Theme’,” on which guest vocalist Meagan McNeal introduces the band with the same hypnotic theme used by the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s when Michael Jordan played with the team.

From there, Hill launches into an entrancing take on a Gigi Gryce’s 1950s minor-blues classic with the two-part mashup “The Way We Play / Minority.” The ensemble accentuates Gryce’s original opening bass line groove before Hill and McBride articulate the zigzagging melodic figure in unison. The rhythm soon breaks into a quicksilver swing forward motion that sweeps Hill’s authoritative improvisation. The inventive makeover also features spoken-word artist Harold Green III delivering lyrical prose that aptly describes the Chicago sound.

“Prelude,” a dulcet trumpet solo, gives way to the mesmerizing rendition of Horace Silver’s late-1950s composition “Moon Rays” with which McCraven and Ramos underpin with a skittering, almost drum-n-bass flow. “I learned that tune when I was a sophomore in high school in an after-school program called the Merit School of Music,” Hill recalls. “The melody is so beautiful and so singable.”

The mood simmers down for Hill’s sensual take on Victor Young and Ned Washington’s classic ballad “My Foolish Heart.” In addition to the subtle, R&B rhythmic flourishes lurking underneath, Hill’s makeover also stars Christie Dashiell, who brings a soothing, sunny verve to the fore as Hill’s muted trumpet interjects melodic asides.

Amorous overtones continue with a stunning reading of Jimmy Van Heusen and Johnny Burke’s “Polka Dots and Moonbeams” of which Hill almost plays entirely solo on flugelhorn, which allows listeners to full luxuriate inside his velvety tone and graceful improvisation.

With the help of percussionist Juan Pastor, the tempo picks back up with an Afro-Cuban take on Donald Byrd’s mid-1960s burner “Fly Little Bird Fly,” another tune highlighted by Green’s uplifting prose. This tune is especially personal for Hill because Byrd is one of his biggest and earliest jazz influences. “When I was in high school, he was the cat that I wanted to sound like,” Hill remembers. “When I was in high school, I was on a mission to find every record that Donald Byrd was on.”

The Chicago connection between Hill and the material becomes even more pronounced with the delightful cover of “Maiden Voyage,” a mid-1960s standard, written by fellow Windy City-native Herbie Hancock. On Hill’s version, he slowed the tempo and dropped the key to G-flat to give the evocative composition darker hues.

After bursting through a flinty exploration through the Thelonious Monk mid-1960s staple “Straight No Chaser,” Hill digs deep into the post-bop canon and unearths Carmell Jones’ rare 1965 tune, “Beep Durple,” on which the frontline horns deftly tackle the tricky melody atop a fractured yet forward motion rhythmic bed. The ebullient rendition also features trombonist and fellow-Chicagoan Vincent Gardner of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra.

Peruvian rhythms burst forth from Pastor’s cajón drumming on “Juan’s Interlude,” before the disc concludes with an Afro-Latin 7/4 version of Charlie Chaplin’s 1936 signature tune “Smile.” Featuring just trumpet, bass and cajón, Hill’s zesty rendition makes a fitting conclusion for The Way We Play, a fetching refurbishing of old favorites with a decidedly 21st-century twist.

Marquis Hill, trumpet, flugelhorn
Christofer McBride, alto saxophone
Justin "Jusefan" Thomas, vibraphone
Joshua Ramos, bass
Makaya McCraven, drums

Recorded Anthony Gravino at Bunker Studios, Brooklyn, NY
Mastered by Paul Blackmore
Mixed by Seth Presant
Produced by Marcuis Hill

Marquis Hill
Chicago has long been a major jazz cradle. Ever since pioneers such as Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, and King Oliver planted seeds of the music in 1917, the Windy City has birthed numerous jazz titans of various stylistic idioms, ranging from such swing stalwarts as Benny Goodman and Bud Freedman to such modernists as Muhal Richard Abrams, Jack DeJohnette and Herbie Hancock. You can now add 29-year-old Marquis Hill to the list. The New York Times described him as a “dauntingly skilled trumpeter,” and the Chicago Tribune asserts that “his music crystallizes the hard-hitting, hard-swinging spirit of Chicago jazz.”

Hill hones a warm, mellifluous tone on trumpet and flugelhorn with which he unravels sleek melodic passages that are as commanding as they are cogent. As a composer, he builds upon his distinctive sound to craft arresting originals that embrace post-bop, hip-hop, R&B and spoken word. After releasing four well-received discs on Skiptone Music – New Gospel (2011), Sound of the City (2012), The Poet (2013) and Modern Flows, vol. 1 (2014) – Hill raised his profile significantly by winning the 2014 Thelonious Trumpet Competition, which awarded him a $25,000 scholarship and a recording contract with Concord Records.

His enthralling Concord Records debut, The Way We Play will have featured Hill fronting his commanding ensemble, the Blacktet (altoist Christopher McBride, vibraphonist Justin Thomas, bassist Joshua Ramos, drummer Makaya McCraven and special guests Christie Dashiell, Vincent Gardner, Juan Pastor, and Harold Green III, respectively on voice, trombone, percussion, and spoken word). The Way We Play has captured Hill's uber-tasteful redress of standards, many learnt in formative years. Classics like Hancock’s “Maiden Voyage” and Monk’s “Straight No Chaser” have been joined by less known things like Carmell Jones’ “Beep Durple” and Donald Byrd’s “Fly Little Bird Fly." Always reverencing essence, Hill yet brought his lyrically postmodern groove to the material.

Music captured and cultivated Hill’s powerful imagination from very early on. While growing up in the Chatham neighborhood on Chicago’s South Side, he began playing drums in the forth grade but was soon wooed toward trumpet by his older cousin's practicing of the instrument. His introduction to jazz, fifth grade, was via attendance at Dixon Elementary. The school’s band director Diane Ellis gave him a Lee Morgan album, quickly igniting and lighting a strategic young pilgrimage. “I praise her a lot,” says Hill. “I listened to that Lee Morgan record and had my mind blown. Since that moment I’ve just been in love with this music.”

The next year, Hill met another musical educator who would have a profound influence – Ronald Carter. In addition to being the jazz director for Northern Illinois University, Carter also ran the South Shore Youth Program, a youth organization that took inner-city kids and paid them every two weeks to rehearse in a big band for five days a week and hold weekly concerts. Carter made such an indelible impression that he inspired Hill to attend Northern Illinois University (NIU) after attending Kenwood Academy High School. Hill graduated from the NIU in 2009 with a Bachelor of Arts in Music Education.

Hill also participated in the Ravinia Jazz Scholars, which afforded him the opportunity to learn under such established jazz artists as guitarist Bobby Broom, pianist Willie Pickens, and trumpeter Tito Carrillo. While still an undergraduate, Hill became one of Chicago’s most in-demand jazz trumpeters; he made noteworthy club dates with a host of the Chi-Town’s finest including saxophonists Von Freeman and Fred Anderson.

Hill’s formal musical education continued at DePaul University’s School of Music, where he earned a graduate degree in jazz pedagogy. Even as a recording artist, leading his Blacktet and appearing on recordings by such Chicago-based artists as singer Milton Suggs, saxophonist Ernest Dawkins, and bassist Matt Ulery, Hill maintained his involvement in music education by teaching at the University of Illinois in Chicago, Harold Washington College, the Birch Creek Music Performance Center in Egg Harbor, Wis., and the NIU Summer Jazz Camp.

In 2014, Hill moved to New York while still making numerous appearances in Chicago. Focusing on his solo career is paramount, but he’s still making waves as a sideman for internationally acclaimed artists such as bassist Marcus Miller and saxophonist Joe Lovano. Two years after winning the Monk Competition, Hill says that he’s still on cloud nine. “Winning that competition taught me to trust myself and keep working hard for what I believe in,” he says. “That experience taught me that I’m here for a purpose. So I need to keep pushing my music forward.”

This album contains no booklet.