LATEST NEWS

• “RUSH” by Lucian Ban & ELEVATION featuring Abraham Burton, John Hébert and Eric McPherson out now on Sunnyside Records

  

  September 2026 → Sunnyside Records presents Rush, the third album by Lucian Ban & ELEVATION and the pianist’s twelfth release for the label. Marking nearly two decades of the ensemble’s evolution, the quartet — featuring saxophonist Abraham Burton, bassist John Hébert, and drummer Eric McPherson — returns following Songs from Afar, hailed as Downbeat’s Best Album of the Year in the magazine’s 2016 Critics Poll. On Rush, Ban’s original compositions bring the ensemble’s distinctive musical language into even sharper focus, while his deeply personal dedications to Abdullah Ibrahim, Andrew Hill, Larry Willis, and Billy Strayhorn are less tributes than conversations across generations. The album reflects both the quartet’s evolution and the musical voices that have shaped Ban’s artistic path. The album concludes with a haunting arrangement of an ancient Transylvanian folk song, featuring traditional singer and special guest Gavril Tarmure, bringing Ban’s musical journey full circle.

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• “THE ATHENAEUM CONCERT” and “CANTICA PROFANA” by Lucian Ban, John Surman, Mat Maneri out now on Sunnyside Records

  

  

  September 2025 → For this double release, long time collaborators pianist Lucian Ban and violist Mat Maneri alongside legendary woodwind master JOHN SURMAN further explore the folk music of Transylvania collected by Béla Bartók more than a hundred years ago. Taking the music on the road, the trio has deepened the spirit of their music while touring, as can be heard on their new recordings, THE ATHENAEUM CONCERT (vinyl) and the companion CANTICA PROFANA (cd). There is a spirit that passes through all the folkloric music of the world. The sounds may differ from region to region and from people to people, but folk music holds deeper truths that speak to the connective tissue of humanity. There is something mysterious in the way peasants or, for that matter, jazz musicians approach music. "It was such a joy for us to use these varied intonations and folkloric approaches from around the world – filtered through our love of improvisation and the jazz vernacular – to dig deeper into these folk songs and find that right microtone, which we see as a macrotone, for it is these notes which bring out the heightened emotions of all folk music . . .  a “pulsing life of peasant-music” carrying us forward".

  Get THE ATHENAEUM CONCERT here: 

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• “TRANSYLVANIAN DANCE” by Lucian Ban & Mat Maneri out now on ECM Records

  

  September 2024 2023 → On their second ECM duo album Romanian pianist Lucian Ban and US violist Mat Maneri find fresh inspiration as they follow the trail of Béla Bartók, revisiting the folk music that spurred the imagination of the great Hungarian composer who, in the early 20th century, collected and transcribed numerous pieces from Transylvania. For the duo these songs have become “springboards and sources of melodic material” for arrangements “that capture the spirit of the original yet allow us to improvise and bring our own world to them. If you go deeper into the source material, new vistas open up. These folk songs teach us many things.” (Steve Lake, album liner notes). Recorded live in October 2022 in the context of the Retracing Bartók project in Timișoara, these performances also bear testimony to the finely attuned understanding that Lucian Ban and Mat Maneri have achieved in their long-running musical partnership.

  Get the album here:  ECM

• Alex Harding & Lucian Ban “BLUTOPIA” featuring BOB STEWART out now Sunnyside Records

  

  MAY 2024 → The new recording, BLUTOPIA showcases the leaders’ attuned rapport developed over decades of collaborations into an album that transcends the expectations of the jazz genre. The music on Blutopia is mysterious yet rooted, with legendary Bob Stewart tuba speaking of the whole history of jazz, yet Ban’s use of the Fender Rhodes and Mat Maneri’s electronic effects giving a contemporary, Afro-Futurist meets new music tint. Drummer ace Brandon Lee Lewis completes this stellar ensemble. 

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• “OEDIPE REDUX” based on George Enescu Oedipe opera out on Sunnyside Records

  MAY 2023 → Nearly ninety years after its opening in Paris at Opera Garnier, Transylvanian expat pianist Lucian Ban and American violist Mat Maneri present a radical re-imagination of George Enescu’s famous Oedipe opera. To reinvent Oedipe for the 21st century, Ban and Maneri streamlined Enescu’s score for a smaller, more flexible ensemble and knew they needed musical cohorts that would be able to immediately understand the project and bring their own personalities into the music. They recruited trumpeter Ralph Alessi, bassist John Hébert, drummer Tom Rainey, and French clarinetist Louis Sclavis, a legend in the world of contemporary music and improv in Europe. And for the vocal parts, perhaps the most important element of the opera, they invited Jen Shyu and Theo Bleckmann, both brilliant contemporary vocalists, that could handle Enescu’s difficult lines and bring new life to Oedipe Redux. Lucian Ban and Mat Maneri harness the spirit of George Enescu’s masterwork, Oedipe, and channel it into a modern recreation in their own vernacular. Oedipe Redux is a breathtaking retelling, breathing new life into one of the most storied tales of human drama.

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• “WAYS OF DISAPPEARING” Lucian Ban first piano solo album out on Sunnyside Records

  MAY 2022 → Lucian Ban’s mesmerizing new recording of solo piano improvisations, Ways of Disappearing is out on Sunnyside Records. Featured in The Wall Street Journal, album garners glowing reviews in Downbeat, New York City Jazz Record, etc. Recorded in his native Transylvania in the stunning Baroque Hall in Timisoara, in May 2021, in the midst of a world standing still, the album represents a daring addition to the genre and is a powerful and uncompromising statement for his first unaccompanied solo album. Co-produced with long time collaborator, violist Mat Maneri, the album presents 14 pieces and improvisations’ including Lucian’s chilling takes on two modern jazz standards, by Annette Peacock and Carla Bley, respectively.

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