FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Columbia Records is set to release Gardenias For Lady Day -- the first new album in more than three years from James Carter and the saxophonist's first recording since signing with the label -- on Tuesday, November 11.

With Gardenias For Lady Day, the saxophone virtuoso pays homage to the indomitable spirit of Billie Holiday and the complexity of her musical legacy with a cohesive group of soundworks that evoke the sublime sadness and haunted turbulence of Lady Day's life and era.

Four of the album's eight compositions -- "(I Wonder) Where Our Love Has Gone," "I'm In A Low Down Groove," "Strange Fruit," and "More Than You Know" -- are part of Billie Holiday's recorded repertoire while the others -- "Gloria" (recorded by Don Byas), "Sunset" (recorded by Cab Calloway), "A Flower Is A Lovesome Thing" (recorded by Duke Ellington), and "Indian Summer" (recorded by Coleman Hawkins) -- were recorded by contemporaries of Lady Day.

Gardenias For Lady Day is produced by Yves Beauvais. Strings on the album are conducted by bassist/composer Greg Cohen (Tom Waits, John Zorn's Masada, Lou Reed, David Byrne, David Sanborn). The tracks "Flower Is A Lovesome Thing," "Indian Summer," "Strange Fruit," and "More Than You Know" are arranged by Greg Cohen. "Sunset," "I Wonder Where Our Love Is Gone," and "Gloria" are arranged by Cassius Richmond. "I'm In A Low Down Groove" is arranged by Cassius Richmond and James Carter. Carter's ensemble on Gardenias For Lady Day includes John Hicks (piano), Peter Washington (bass), and Victor Lewis (drums).

Gardenias For Lady Day is the first James Carter collection since the simultaneous release, in June 2000, of Layin' In The Cut, an electric jazz/funk collective jam session, and Chasin' The Gypsy, an homage to Django Reinhardt. In a review of those two albums, Rolling Stone (August 3, 2000) asserted that "....saxophonist James Carter is as near as jazz gets nowadays to a Young Turk -- not some ironically avant-post-rock experimentalist but a cocky scene stealer with...a knack for coming up with noticeable records."

James Carter recently topped Downbeat's annual Critics Poll in the Baritone Saxophone category for the third year in a row.

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Born in Detroit, Michigan, in 1969, James Carter began playing at age 11, first recorded with a Detroit student ensemble in 1986 and, by 1991, had recorded with legendary trumpeter Lester Bowie on The Organizer and contributed to the 1991 collection The Tough Young Tenors. Mastering a family of reed instruments, from sopranino to contrabass saxophones to contrabass and bass clarinets, James Carter mesmerized the jazz world after arriving in New York City in 1988 to play under the auspices of Lester Bowie.

His debut recording, JC On The Set, released in Japan when Carter was a mere 23 years old, heralded the arrival of a significant and powerful new musical force in jazz. Recorded at the same session as his debut, Carter's next release, Jurassic Classics (1994), found him entering the Top Jazz Albums chart for the first time. It was a feat to be echoed with four of Carter's subsequent releases: The Real Quiet Storm (1995), Conversin' With The Elders (1996), In Carterian Fashion (1998), and Chasin' The Gypsy (2000).

Carter has performed, either live or in the studio, with the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, the late Julius Hemphill, Ronald Shannon Jackson, the Charles Mingus Big Band, soprano Kathleen Battle, Aretha Franklin, David Murray, the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Ginger Baker, Sonny Rollins, and many others. He appeared in the 1994 PBS telecast of "Live At Lincoln Center" and portrayed saxophonist Ben Webster in Robert Altman's 1996 film, "Kansas City."

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Gardenias For Lady Day is being released in the hybrid Super Audio CD (SACD) format. Hybrid Super Audio CD discs feature a high-density layer which can provide high-resolution, multi-channel surround sound in addition to a separate two-channel stereo SACD version of the same music, and a layer with a CD version of the recording. The result is a hybrid disc whose full audio potential can be realized by the new generation of SACD players, and which is fully compatible with all other existing CD players on the market today.

related links:

Columbia Records online: www.columbiarecords.com