Album Notes

Rob Auler is a concert classical pianist and piano professor at SUNY Oswego. He is also a professional jazz pianist; his jazz experience has informed this performance, adding authenticity and a jazz-inflected time-feel. Rob was thrilled to collaborate on this record with respected professionals such as Dan Wood (multi-platinum engineer/producer), Paul Bertalan (Syracuse. NY legend and classical music expert) and Tamar-Tafari Greene (SUNY Oswego graduate/ performer/producer). The album features newly-composed works by influential composers Jonathan Pieslak (Spiral, Shards), Rudolf Haken (Triathlon) and Carter Pann (Upstate: A Slow Drag). Additionally, it features "classics" such as Gershwin's Three Preludes, and Samuel Barber's landmark Piano Sonata. One composition (Kapustin's Sonata-Fantasie) is by a non-American composer, but his material is so infused with the jazz idiom that we couldn't leave it out!