Album Notes

Eric Plaks, a native of Princeton, NJ, has called Harlem, NY home for the last twelve years. When not playing and recording jazz music over the past twelve years, Eric has been teaching public school music classes in Harlem and the Bronx. His latest album, Eric Plaks with Strings, represents years of collaboration with close friends and colleagues, playing at venues throughout New York City and the surrounding region. Eric teams up with two electric guitarists to create a surprisingly clutter-free album, in which the guitarists capitalize on the innate differences in their sounds to create the full texture of the front-line horn section in a hard-bop ensemble, such as Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers from the 1960s. Using guitar effects drawn from rock and a loose interpretation of the hard-swinging jazz tradition, Eric Plaks and his Quintet have created an edgy instrumental jazz album with a broad-based appeal.