Michael Blake (musician)

In October 2022 Michael released Comboblulate for Newvelle Records. He arranged 10 new pieces for the album which features a brass band with two tuba players Marcus Rojas and Bob Stewart, trombonist Clark Gayton, trumpeter Steven Bernstein and drummer Allan Mednard. Downbeat Magazine's Anthony Dean-Harris gave Combobulate 4 stars and wrote, "...when not blowing minds. They swing. They jam. They definitely impress on their own terms. But there's that extra oomph here that makes them exceptional like the other more genre-twisting tunes throughout the album. It's notable that this is an album playing on another level."

Combobulate was selected as Best Jazz on Bandcamp, October 2022.

Blake rejoined his Lounge Lizards colleagues in 2021 and 2022 to record new music for John Lurie's TV Series Painting with John on HBO.

In early 2020 Michael received a Canada Council of the Arts grant to conceive and record Dance of the Mystic Bliss. The album will be released in spring of 2022 on P&M Records. The music was mixed by Kingdom of Champa engineer Scott Harding and features electric guitarist Guilherme Monteiro, string players Michael Bates, Chris Hoffman and Skye Steele and Brazilian percussionists Mauro Refosco and Rogerio Bocatto.

Starting in 2018 Blake began writing profiles on musicians (Jay Rodrigues, Marcus Rojas, Gina Leishman) published on All About Jazz.

Throughout 2017 Michael performed with the Charlie Hunter Trio and recorded Live at the Memphis Music Mansion with drummer George Sluppick.

In 2016, Blake toured in Italy and Sardinia with his Tiddy Boom Quartet and performed at the historic Sesc Pompéia in São Paulo.

Red Hook Soul received 2016's Best Album Cover Art from The New York City Jazz Record

In 2015 Michael recorded Red Hook Soul (2016) for Ropeadope with Tony Scherr, Erik Deutsch, Ari Blotnick, Moses Patrou and Tim Lüntzel.

From 2015 to 2019 Michael was on faculty at Jerry Granelli's Creative Music Workshop in Halifax, Canada. In 2019 Granelli arranged a residency and recording session with Blake, cellist Peggy Lee, and pianist Chris Gestrin at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity.

Tiddy Boom was selected Album of the Year by DownBeat critic James Hale. The album is listed on several Top 10 Jazz Albums of 2014 lists including The Chicago Reader and Lament for a Straight Line.

In 2013 Michael was funded by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation to write Contrasts in Individualism: The Innovations of Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young. He recorded the music with Ben Allison, Frank Kimbrough and Rudy Royston and released Tiddy Boom the following year on Sunnyside Records. Blake wrote an analysis of his solo from the title track for DownBeat Magazine's Woodshed Department.

Hellbent was selected as Album of the Year in 2010 by Andrey Henkin at All About Jazz

In 2009, The Michael Blake Quartet, including bassist Ben Allison, guitarist Steve Cardenas and drummer Rudy Royston, were a regular at City Winery's Wine & Jazz series.

Michael was on faculty at Siena Jazz Summer Workshop in Italy from 2009 to 2014. His role there included teaching ensembles, saxophone masterclasses and directing student recitals. He also performed in faculty concerts with colleagues including, Enrico Rava, Greg Osby, Kenny Werner, Steve Cardenas, Antonio Sánchez, Eric Harland and Ben Perowsky.

During the summer of 2008 Michael joined the band of Italian trumpeter Enrico Rava on his promotional tour for New York Stories (ECM Records). He was a last minute replacement for saxophonist Mark Turner after he suffered a hand injury.

From 2007 to 2016 Michael began recording a trilogy of Canadian-themed concept albums for the Vancouver-based label Songlines. Collaborating with a new generation of musicians including Brad Turner, Chris Gestrin, Dylan van der Schyff and JP Carter. His first album Amor de Cosmos was dedicated to his grandfather, who died at the age of 101. 2012's In the Grand Scheme of Things makes reference to several of the saxophonists personal experiences, including the birth of his daughter Iris and his brothers wedding in Zambia. Fulfillment is about the ill-fated Komagata Maru incident in which Blake's great-granduncle Henry Herbert Stevens played a role. Created as a work of atonement, the album includes guest performances by the Vancouver born tabla player Neelamjit Dhilon and guitarist Aram Bajakian.

Blake served as musical director for the Neil Sedaka '50 Years of Hits' Celebration at Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Hall on October 26, 2007. The event was a fundraiser for the Elton John AIDS Foundation. Michael performed on saxophone and conducted the house band, backing up Sedaka and other artists who had hits by Sedaka including Connie Francis, The Captain and Tennille and Natalie Cole.

Michael assembled the band Hellbent in 2006 with Calvin G Weston, Steven Bernstein, and Marcus Rojas. Violinist Charlie Burnham also performed with the group. Blake released the live album Hellbent in 2007.

After winning the ear of the Portuguese avant-garde label Clean Feed Records Michael recorded Right Before Your Very Ears in 2005. His first trio album with bassist Ben Allison and drummer Jeff Ballard is a balancing act of both free jazz and original compositions.

Blake played soprano saxophone for the theme to The Backyardigans, a children's TV program produced by Nick Jr. with music by Evan Lurie and Doug Wieselman. From 2004 to 2010 he performed with members of The Lounge Lizards on many Backyardigans episodes and composed the underscore for six episodes.

In 2003 the Canadian composer and bandleader John Korsrud commissioned Michael to compose new works for his Hard Rubber Orchestra. Blake subsequently presented his own big band called The Eulipion Orchestra during his artist-in-residence at the Jazz Standard in NYC. The orchestra featured NYC musicians described by NY Times jazz critic Ben Ratliff as, "from all over the map".

Blake recorded and released Elevated in 2002 on Knitting Factory Records. For their 2001–2002 season Sundance TV hired Blake to write the theme for their TV series Conversations in World Cinema for which he rerecorded several themes from Elevated.

In 2002 Michael recorded Blake Tartare with Danish musicians Kresten Osgood, Soren Kjaergaard, and Jonas Westergaard. The following year he signed with the Danish jazz label Stunt Music to record More Like Us featuring singer/songwriter Maria Laurette-Friss and The World Awakes (2008), a tribute to saxophonist Eli 'Lucky' Thompson. Under Kresten Osgood's leadership, Blake toured Denmark in 2002 and recorded a live album, Hammond Rens featuring organist Lonnie Smith. Blake and Osgood reunited in New York City in 2008 to record Control This for Clean Feed Records. This was the only album on which he plays alto saxophone.

Michael was selected in 2002 by DownBeat magazine's Critics Poll (Talent Deserving Wider Recognition) Categories for Artist of the Year, Tenor Saxophonist and Soprano Saxophonist

Drift was selected as 1999's Album of the Year by Germany's Jazzthing Magazine Critics Poll.

In 1997 Blake formed a band with David Tronzo, Tony Scherr and Kenny Wollesen called Slow Poke. Between 1997 and 2001 Slow Poke recorded Slow Poke at Home and Redemption , toured in Canada and Europe. Slow Poke at Home was re-released in 2005 on Palmetto Records with two additional bonus tracks.

In 1996 Michael signed with Intuition Music and released two albums. His debut album Kingdom of Champa (1997), a concept album about Vietnam, was engineered by Scott Harding and produced by Teo Macero. He reassembled the team of Macero and Harding to produce and mix his second release Drift.

As well as his affiliation with The Lounge Lizards, Michael worked as a sideman in the 1990s with Jack McDuff, Charlie Persip, Gil Evans Orchestra, and singer Henry Fiol. He became a composer in residence for the Jazz Composers Collective in 1995 and joined the Herbie Nichols Project, a repertoire ensemble devoted to the music of pianist/composer Herbie Nichols.

In the fall of 1989 Blake started working with John Lurie and The Lounge Lizards, and for that band he began playing soprano saxophone. Michael toured, recorded, and performed with the band until 1999. He appeared on the albums Live in Berlin Vol 1 & 2 and Queen of All Ears and is featured in the Lounge Lizards concert film, John Lurie and the Lounge Lizards Live in Berlin 1991. Blake also played saxophone and clarinet on Lurie's TV series Fishing with John and film scores for Get Shorty and Excess Baggage.

Michael began his professional career in Vancouver, performing with local jazz musicians Hugh Fraser, Phil Dwyer, John Korsrud, Jim Chivers and Kate Hammett-Vaughan. He also worked with west coast R&B acts, The Powder Blues Band and Rocket Norton. In 1986 Michael received a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts to live in New York City where he would study saxophone and theory with David Liebman.

Michael Blake was born in Montreal, Canada. His mother Merle Stevens was a professional dancer in Montreal when she met his father Francis Patrick Blake. Michael's father moved the family to Vancouver and Toronto before taking a Public Relations job with the San Francisco Opera. In 1973, after his parents divorced, they resettled in Vancouver, Canada, where Michael briefly took lessons on violin and piano. At the age of 14, around the same time his older brother started playing alto saxophone, he picked up the clarinet. Michael started on the tenor saxophone in High School after reading the biography Chasin' the Trane about saxophonist John Coltrane. From 1982 to 1984 Blake attended the Vancouver Community College Jazz and Commercial Music Program where he studied saxophone and clarinet with David Branter. After finishing the program, Blake studied privately with saxophonist Patric Caird. From 1984 to 1985 he attended summer jazz workshops at The Banff Center for Arts and Creativity, studying saxophone with Steve Coleman and David Liebman.

Michael Blake (born May 19, 1964) is a Canadian-born American saxophonist, composer and arranger. Blake is based in New York City where he has led a robust career leading his own bands. As a sideman Michael has performed with Charlie Hunter, The Lounge Lizards, Steven Bernstein/Henry Butler and the Hot 9, Ben Allison, Nicole Mitchell, Hamid Drake, Oliver Lake Big Band, Dafnis Prieto Big Band, Ricki Lee Jones and Ray LaMontagne. The New York Times jazz critic Ben Ratliff wrote,"Mr. Blake, on tenor especially, is an endlessly engaging improviser, and an inquisitive one".