Nicolas Simion Trio - The Wild Dogs (2004)

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Nicolas Simion was born 1959 in Dumbravita, a small village in the Carpathian Mountains of Transylvania. He showed his musical talent very early and was sent to the Brasov Music School at the age of ten. After that he appointed the Music Academy in Bucharest where he completed his classial music studies. During that time he discovered his affection for improvised music and founded his first jazz Band Opus 4 in the early eighties, with pianist Mircea Tiberian and sax player Dan Mandrila. This band soon became the most successful jazz band in Romania. After numerous appearances in the country and invitations to jazz festivals in East-Berlin and Warsaw he decided to emigrate to the west in 1989. Arriving in Vienna he met both local and international jazz heroes and, for the first time in his life, had the opportunity to play with them. Among them Art Farmer, Leo Wright, Idris Muhammad, Jim Pepper, Harry Sokal, Christian Muthspiel and others and, with the latter, he recorded his first album in the west as a sideman. His first CD under his own name, “Black Sea”, was released in 1992. Since then he drew the attention of a growing audience with periodical releases. With him were names like Graham Haynes, Lonnie Plaxico, Ed Schuller, Peter Perfido and pianist Mal Waldron The latter replaced the much too soon deceased sax player Jim Pepper in his band with young Nicolas Simion. Since then both musicians shared a fertile musical relationship which culminated in extended tours and the release of the duo recording “The Big Rochade” in 1998. What Mal Waldron appreciates of Nicolas Simion is his flexibility and intuition, as well as his ethnic background. Another very important companion Simion’s was polish trumpeter Tomasz Stanko, with whom he released some very interesting recordings. Gunther Schuller, the great Third Stream composer, was so pleased with the music of Nicolas Simion, that he decided to release a recording on his own label GM Recordings in the states. He also chose the sax player as a soloist on his project “The Music of Jim Pepper”. [...] Simion is one of the most innovative musicians on today’s scene. A growing audience is observing his development as he is finding his way to the musical “Olymp”. (Source: last.fm/music)

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The Music:
01 - Underground #2 03:33
02 - Transylvanian Dance 07:29
03 - Stag's March 06:17
04 - Longing 06:08
05 - Cold Turkey 09:23
06 - The Wild Dogs Of Giulesti 04:43
07 - Slovakian Folk Song 06:47
08 - Lazy Finger 04:21
09 - Transylvanian Dance (Bonus Track) 08:37

The Players:
* Nicolas Simion - tenor sax, bass clarinet
* Angus Bangus Thomas - bass
* Peter Perfido - drums

Recorded May 2004 in Bucharest, Romania