Patricia Barber To Release Mythologies

New York, NY. (Blue Note Records) - GUGGENHEIM AWARD-WINNING SINGER-PIANIST-COMPOSER PATRICIA BARBER TO RELEASE MYTHOLOGIES, NEW JAZZ SONG CYCLE BASED UPON GREEK MYTHOLOGY, AUG. 15

In 2003, the acclaimed singer-pianist-composer Patricia Barber became one of the few Jazz musicians ever to be awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, and she took the opportunity to create one of the most ambitious and affecting works of her career. Mythologies is a song cycle based on Greek mythology, which uses characters from The Metamorphoses of Ovid as the basis for each of the 11 songs, giving these timeless stories a uniquely contemporary and compelling musical setting.

Reviewing the work's debut performance at Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art in January, Howard Reich of the Chicago Tribune called Mythologies 'potentially revelatory,' adding that 'Barber brilliantly has found the means to re-imagine a piece of literature for a jazz context…The expressive range of this music proves thrilling…These songs stand on their own as immensely attractive jazz pieces, apart from their source material.'

Barber, whom TIME magazine once referred to as a cross between Susan Sontag and Diana Krall, has recorded Mythologies for release on Blue Note Records on August 15. Built around her dynamic quartet, Mythologies also features a guest saxophonist, vocal soloists, a gospel choir, and children hip hop artists.

Barber will give a full-scale performance of Mythologies in her hometown of Chicago on September 16 at the Chicago Symphony Center as part of the Day of Music Festival. She will also take the road this Fall, performing the music from Mythologies with her long-standing quartet featuring guitarist Neal Alger, bassist Michael Arnopol and drummer Eric Montzka.

PATRICIA BARBER- U.S. TOUR DATES
Sept. 1-3: Jazz Standard - New York, NY
Sept. 11-12: Dakota Jazz Club - Minneapolis, MN
Sept. 16: Chicago Symphony Center - Chicago, IL
Sept. 21-22: Sculler's Jazz Club - Boston, MA
Oct. 6-7: The Vault - Long Beach, CA
Oct. 10-11: The Triple Door - Seattle, WA

TRACK LISTING
1. The Moon
2. Morpheus
3. Pygmalion
4. Hunger
5. Icarus (for Nina Simone)
6. Orpheus/Sonnet
7. Persephone
8. Narcissus
9. Whiteworld/Oedipus
10. Phaethon
11. The Hours