Ingrid Jensen
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Ingrid Jensen

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"Celebrating Her Album, With Trumpet Blazing"

"Feels like home," the trumpeter Ingrid Jensen observed at one point on Thursday night at the 55 Bar. She was referring not only to the setting, a frequent haunt since her arrival in New York more than 15 years ago, but also to the occasion: she was celebrating the release of "At Sea" (ArtistShare), an album inspired in part by her recent honeymoon in Alaska. Her husband, Jon Wikan, produced the album, and he was close at hand; he also happens to be her drummer.

Intimacy isn't always a hallmark of Ms. Jensen's music. As a soloist, she favors rhythmic assertiveness and chromatic tension, a combination suggestive of post-bop trumpet heroes like Woody Shaw. "At Sea" gestures toward a gentler sensibility at times, beginning with the yearning and ethereal title track.

Thursday's first set was sequenced like the album, and so it opened hazily, with a wash of cymbals and indeterminate chords. Ms. Jensen played the melody with a muted horn, deploying electronic echoes for good measure. Her solid band - Mr. Wikan with Geoffrey Keezer on Fender Rhodes keyboard, Matt Clohesy on bass and Lage Lund on guitar - briefly savored the abstraction before shifting into gear.

They hit full stride on the next tune, Mr. Keezer's bright Latin-bop entry "Capt'n Jon." (There's a theme at work here.) Ms. Jensen and Mr. Lund doubled the soaring melody over a bubbling bass ostinato; they both soloed, too, though Mr. Keezer's choruses were the more engagingly high-spirited.

Ms. Jensen spent roughly half the set courting melancholy with her fluegelhorn, on which she has a warm and shadowy tone. But she sounded better when she was blazing. Her closing piece, "Swotterings," provided the perfect opportunity, progressing from a second-line groove to a breakneck modal swing. Ms. Jensen's solo came across as impetuous yet soundly structured, as she interspersed staccato eighth-note bursts with clarifying pauses.

Those high-flying exertions felt every bit as personal as the set's more introspective moments, perhaps because they captured Ms. Jensen's voice. Digging in with her supportive group, she seemed not at sea, but at home.

By NATE CHINEN

- New York Times


""At Sea" Review by Jerry D'Souza"

"At Sea" Review in All about jazz magazine
On At Sea, Ingrid Jensen continues to cement her reputation as one of the finest players on the trumpet and flugelhorn. She carries a firm grip on the dynamics into the lair of invention to mine some resplendent nuggets, adding mood and atmosphere to make the music throb with vitality and spirit. Jensen draws from a wide palette here. The arc of the music moves from deep, taut ballads to bright, sunny tunes that sparkle. The final layer of beckoning comes from the communication among the musicians.

Jensen bares the soul of “There is No Greater Love” with emotionally gripping playing, getting into the pith of the melody and opening it with riveting heartfelt passion. She wastes not a moment, wanders for not a note. Pianist Geoffrey Keezer, who understands where the core of a tune resides, complements Jensen with his understated but lyrical playing, giving the structure a becoming adjunct.

As Jensen sails across the head of “Everything I Love,” there is no indication of what is to come, jumping up from the rich lore of the Afro-Pruvian landó. Jensen invests a sensual line that slithers enticingly. Hugo Alcázar enriches the body with an array of rhythm instruments that bring in the shimmy and the shake. And as the song moves on, Jensen bites in, her tone getting more pronounced, churning and then calming the storm with a temperate modulation. Serenity wafts across “At Sea,” but even in the calm come storms. Jensen shifts whorls and roiling notes in midstream, before completing the circle with a virtuosic grace.


- All about jazz


"Review: Doug Ramsey"

by Doug Ramsay
Ingrid Jensen, At Sea (ArtistShare). The steadily improving trumpeter manages to sail beyond conventional harmonies and never find herself adrift. Her soloing on several pieces owes something to Miles Davis of the late sixties and early seventies, but the startling interval leaps and graceful lyricism flowing through her improvised lines are her own. Her treatments of two standards are as unconventional as her original compositions and those of pianist Geoffrey Keezer. The drama in Keezer's playing and writing is a good match for Jensen's. Jon Wikan is the dynamic drummer, Matt Cohesey the bassist. The Norwegian guitarist Lage Lund's playing on two tracks made me wish that he was on all of them. - Doug Ramsey

- Arts Journal


""At Sea" Review Irwin Block"

Rating 4

Ingrid Jensen rises above the mist of her mother's recent death
and, propelled by the vistas of an Alaskan boat trip, has produced an
energetic and joyous creative venture. The Canadian rumpeter/flugelhorn
player, composer and leader displays passion and broad vision on her first CD on the cooperative ArtistShare label, and a rare intimacy. She kicks off with the title track, a tone poem, with a short bridge from percussionist Jon Wikan that leads into a collaborative effort featuring pianist/keyboardist Geoffrey Keezer and Matt Clohesy on acoustic bass. Jensen shines on her ballads As Love Does and KD Lang, and soars on Swotterings, inspired by Steve Swallow and Chris Potter, featuring guitarist Lage Lund.

- Motreal Gazette


Discography

Ingrid Jensen, At Sea 2006 - Artist Share
Ingrid Jensen, Now As Then - Justin Time
Ingrid Jensen, Higher Grounds - Enja
Ingrid Jensen, Here On Earth - Enja
Ingrid Jensen, Vernal Fields - Enja

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Bio

Born in Vancouver and raised in Nanaimo, Canada, Ingrid headed east after receiving a number of scholarships to attend the Berklee College of Music in Boston. Since graduating in 1989, her life has contained a whirlwind of musical activities. From her early days playing in the subways of New York, to establishing herself as a leader and soloist in a wide array of musical genres, Ingrid has made her mark. Her three CD's for the ENJA label won her nominations from the Canadian Juno Awards, including an award in 1995 for Vernal Fields.

Her performances as a leader and as a featured soloist have taken her around the world from Canada to Japan, Australia, South America, the Caribbean and to almost every country in Europe and Scandinavia.

Jensen can be heard with the Maria Schneider Orchestra, a number of other New York-based bands, as well as with her own groups. She has received rave reviews and a strong reputation among critics and peers. In 2003 she was nominated, for the second time, alongside trumpeter Dave Douglas for a Jazz Journalist Association Award in New York. A recent highlight was being featured on Gil Evans' Porgy and Bess at the San Francisco Jazz Festival, under the direction of Maria Schneider. She was also a guest in the festival's "Tribute to Woody Shaw and Freddie Hubbard", alongside Terence Blanchard, Eddie Henderson, Bobby Hutcherson and Kenny Garrett. Some of the many musicians she has performed and or recorded with include; Steve Wilson, Jeff 'Tain' Watts, Dr.Lonnie Smith, Marc Copland, Bob Berg, Gary Thomas, Gary Bartz, Jeff Hamilton, Bill Stewart, Terri-Lynn Carrington, Geoffrey Keezer, Billy Hart, George Garzone, Chris Connor, Victor Lewis, Clark Terry, and the DIVA Big Band.

Jensen is currently on faculty at the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore. From 1990 until 1992 she was professor of Jazz Trumpet at the Bruckner Conservatory of Music and at the Hochshule for Musik in Berlin. Jensen continues to fill her schedule with an astonishing array of artistic creativity as a performer and educator. In addition to performing, she conducts master classes, clinics, and workshops. Her current summer workshops include positions at the Salzburg Jazz Seminar, the Centrum Jazz Camp at Port Townsend, and The Brubeck Institute.