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Turkey's Instrumental Guitar Entry
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Billed as one of Turkey's first instrumental guitarists, Serdar Oztop's first CD Sukut is a stunning example of the compositional and playing ability of this artist. Featuring ten instrumentals, the album offers blazing, cleanly and confidently played axework while containing enough surprises and twists to stand up to repeated listenings. Oztop was trained as an engineer, so the production and recording is top notch. Graceful ballads such as "Kalabaligin Ortasinda" alternate with ethnically enriched pieces ("Yeni Gun"), and fierce, all-out-pedal-to-the-floor rockers ("Azraille Dans"). Oztop has mastered the fine art of balancing memorable, melodic and harmonized guitar lines with impressively fluid, smoking speed solos, and that alone is enough to highly recommend Sukut to guitar fans.
Serdar was born in Istanbul, Turkey in 1970. His introduction to music came from playing the mandolin in primary school. Serdar picked up the electric guitar in high school, and later started to play original compositions with his first band, Exon, which I formed in the beginning of his years at university. After he graduated from the electronics school at Bogazici University, he started working in Spectrum Recording Studio as a sound engineer, also joining the Turkish rock band "Kesmeseker" Serdar later set up a home studio, continued my studies as a producer-arranger. In a short time, he had the chance to work with Turkey's top rock stars and became a well known producer and guitarist.
Oztop continues to gig around the Istanbul area and hopes to make a big splash all over the world with his instrumental release.
Contact Information
Serdar Oztop
Tasmerdiven Cikmazi No. 8
Findikh / Istanbul
Turkey
E-mail:
Serdar Oztop
Web site:
www.serdaroztop.com
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Interactive, Melodic, Contemporary Jazz
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New Time is a self-described "Pat Metheny meets Steve Vai at a party Martin Medeski Wood held for Miles Davis" collection of instrumental tunes written and performed by Canadian guitarist Sean Meredith-Jones, along with his quartet. This jazz/fusion CD offers the highest quality of musicianship, as Meredith-Jones spearheads the interactivity between the musicians with an array of clean and highly overdriven tones. The nine-minute opening track, "Dark Night Of The Soul", sets the standard in this regard, starting off slow and benign, then leading to a fiery guitar solo in the middle and end sections. Look no further than "Saying Goodbye" for an example of Meredith-Jones' Metheny influence, while "Agape" is a musical conversation between Meredith-Jones' six-string and guest Phil Dwyer's soprano sax - great tune. Fusion fans take special note of the music coming out of this Toronto area quartet.
Sean has been playing guitar for the last 17 years. He started with private guitar lessons at the age of nine, and in 1994 was accepted to Berklee College of Music in Boston Massachusetts. Sean completed a four-year degree program majoring in Performance, studying composition and improvisation in a more intense environment. For the past four years, he has been teaching private guitar lessons, performing and composing. Sean currently has approximately 30 guitar students while also concurrently studying with jazz guitar great Lorne Lofsky. For the past four years, he has had the privilege of playing in the Du Maurier jazz festival in Toronto, at the Orbit Room. His group have opened for the likes of the Phil Dwyer quintet, as well as for Doug Riley's Hammond B3 quartet and quintets.
Typically, the Sean Meredith-Jones live shows are as a quartet. Some of the locations they have played thus far have been The Rex Hotel, the Montreal Bistro, and the Orbit Room The lineup of players is Ben Riley (Planet Earth, Mo Koffman, Joe Sealy, Holly Cole, Doug Riley, Bruce Cockburn) on drums, Michael Pellarin on bass, and Michael Janzen on piano/Hammond B3 organ.
Contact Information
Sean Meredith-Jones
49 Robin Hood Road
Toronto, ON M9A 2W6
Canada
E-mail:
Sean Meredith-Jones
Web site:
www.seanmeredithjones.com
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