By Beth Ann Hilton
For Roger Davidson, music is a world without boundaries. It is also a perfect path to divine connection, either playing the music for which he’s reknowned, or his latest approach, Solo Piano. No matter what the genre, one can hear the passion and joy in Roger’s music. This year, the NY-based pianist/composer/producer is sharing new areas of his life, with a new album (Temple of the Soul: Rhapsodies and Meditations for Solo Piano), a new ministry, and a new plan for sharing the multitude of sacred music curated the Society for Universal Sacred Music, which he founded in 2000. Roger often signs his emails with something he believes to the core of his being, and which seems to come through in his music: “With blessings and a reminder of God's universal and unconditional love for all!” Recently, NewAgeMusicReviews reviewed Temple of the Soul, proclaiming “This is an album that eases your mind, body and spirit. Yes, the triangle of life receives a surge of energy by absorbing this powerful yet serene music.” Roger says that “Temple of the Soul” - more than any previous album - embraces his musical past and merges it with his ongoing passion for Sacred Music, which manifested in 1982 with Unispace (for choir, organ, piano, and percussion), inspired by a United Nations conference of the same name on the peaceful uses of outer space. His Sacred Music recordings include One God, One World and Missa Universalis (Soundbrush Records), both of which include choral works representing the beginnings of what he later termed "Universal Sacred Music." In 2000, Roger created the Society for Universal Sacred Music (SUSM) as part of his lifelong commitment to creating a repertoire of sacred music that celebrates the unity and unconditional love of God. The Society became a worldwide collective, commissioning, performing and recording over 50 works, and organizing five editions of the Festival of Universal Sacred music, featuring performers from around the world. Cross-cultural celebration is the theme of Soundbrush Records, the celebrated company that Roger founded. He has developed an impressive roster of hand-picked musicians from around the world and a rich, diverse catalogue including tango master Raśl Jaurena, whose 2007 Soundbrush release, Te Amo Tango, won a Latin GRAMMY®. Soundbrush is also the home of many of Roger’s eighteen albums including the recent Journey to Rio, a double-CD of his Brazilian compositions, recorded in Rio with a band of top-flight Brazilian players and produced by Pablo Aslan, the gifted Argentine bassist and bandleader. International co-mingling is in Roger’s blood. He was born in Paris in 1952 to a French mother and an American father; when he was one year old, the family moved to New York. He started playing piano at four, and taking violin lessons at eight. He has studied at Boston University, earning a master’s degree in composition in 1980, then with early baroque music scholar Sidney Beck, who suggested he attend Westminster Choir College in Princeton, New Jersey, where Roger began writing choral music. In the mid-‘80s, Roger took his first steps toward a professional jazz career when he twice attended the Stanford Jazz Workshop at Stanford University in California, studying under visiting teachers Stan Getz and Dizzy Gillespie. As a jazz pianist, Roger went on to be mentored by Helen Keane, who later produced his first jazz album, and to whom he dedicated the tribute album We Remember Helen (2012). JazzTimes has since called him an “impeccable player.” “It’s been a great blessing that I’ve been able to do so many things well, and that they feel natural, as part of the global musical vocabulary I’ve developed,” he says. “I feel a lot of empathy for all kinds of good music – music that really comes from the heart and that seeks to communicate passion and positive feelings.” In 2013, Roger embarked on Temple of the Soul, producing and recording it on an impeccably-restored Steinway at the studio of two-time Grammy®-winner Adam Abeshouse. Roger maintains that this intensely personal album is not a diversion from other genres, but rather a forward-moving culmination of his inspirations, lifelong studies, world-wide collaborations, and interest in Sacred Music. In a way, it is a holistic stepping stone to the next stage of Roger’s life as an ordained minister, which will include continuing his spiritual work, creating new music and disseminating music from the Society for Universal Sacred Music. The new album, he says, is “not just a journey of the spirit; it’s an intuitive journey around the world. When you have the right color and the right kind of brush to express a feeling or a quality of life, it instinctively comes up and becomes part of the fabric of each piece.” To hear Roger’s music, visit http://soundbrush.com/album/temple-of-the-soul-rhapsodies-and-meditations-for-solo-piano/ |
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