Here are some reviews of my CD "Sun Is All We Need"

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CD Review: Zack Danziger- Sun is All We Need
Label: Self-Produced
Personnel: Zack Danziger- guitar, vocals, bass; Joel Martin- piano, keyboards, background vocals; Jed Levy- saxophone, flute; Paul Lieberman-saxophone, flute, percussion; Barbara Ween- background vocals; David Dunaway- bass; Terry Silverlight- drums

The eclectic and electric Northampton based musician Zack Danziger has achieved a bit of a coup de grace with the release of Sun Is All We Need. He offers here an amalgam of styles that range from irresistibly delectable pop to jazz for the fundamentalist jazzhead in your life, often within the same tune. A formidable force on guitar himself, Mr. Danziger has assembled an A-Team of musical wizards to wring the most out of his compositions and render them whole. What’s more, with pianist/producer Joel Martin and engineer Danny Bernini in the house, the music has been fully realized with all that a state of the art modern recording experience can offer.

Zack’s compositions are autobiographical and at times cosmically cryptic, with grooves so deep you could twist an ankle, and hooks you could hang your hat on; this is by all means accessible music. Many of the tunes are suite-like in their construction, abounding in shifts of time and tone. The title cut for example, features four discrete sections, with subtly shifting harmony vocals and more obvious and effective changes in feel (4/4 funk, 3/4 reggae, a blistering rock solo), and an out chorus of simple acoustic guitar accompanied by improvised whistling that nicely evokes the warmth of the sun. Zoom, a light and bright wordless vocal in a Brazilian bag, borrows a chord progression from Coltrane’s Giant Steps and a familiar hook from Marcos Valle’s Summer Samba to good effect.

From the straight ahead jazz bag, Zack has included an original bop tune Eleven Sharp, the Kurt Weill composition Speak Low (lyric by Ogden Nash for you trivia buffs) and Charlie Parker’s classic blues Now is the Time. On his original, Zack takes the road less traveled, using a trio of his guitar, Joel Martin on piano, and Paul Lieberman on saxophone. Unencumbered by the usual bass & drums rhythm section, the trio cruises at a high altitude with lots of sympatico interaction between three highly intuitive players. This one must have been a lot of fun. On Speak Low, a jazz staple often done in a latin/swing mode, Zack throws a change-up by using 3/4 meter on the latin section, thus breathing some new excitement into the tune. The swing section is indeed swung and the tune winds up with a jam section initiated by Joel on piano that underscores the spontaneity of the session. The Parker blues, which derived from a children’s novelty song called The Hucklebuck in a sense goes back to its roots when Zack gets hold of it, with a new lyric that he roughed out in a 3rd grade classroom in Brooklyn where he was teaching music. The tune builds gradually from Zack’s a cappella rendering to the full band with solos.

Taken as a whole, Sun is All We Need is an excellent characterization of the man behind the music. It represents about fifteen years of wrestling with the Muse and reflects the creativity, spontaneity, and musicianship of Zack Danziger.

- Richard Mayer January 2, 2010
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Hampshire Gazette "Clubland: On the Side (Street) - A Cozy Musical Corner
By KEN MAIURI Gazette Contributing Writer Thursday, October 22, 2009
Zack Danziger and Katherine First perform Tuesday, part of a "Featured Music Artist Series" at the Side Street Cafe in Florence.
Valley nights are getting winterishly chilly, but Florence has a cozy hideaway offering some musical warmth: the Side Street Cafe's "Featured Music Artists Series."
Every Monday and Tuesday night from 6-9 p.m., the celebrated restaurant opens up a corner to spotlight multi-instrumentalist (and series host) Zack Danziger and his guest musician of the night, many of whom are longtime Pioneer Valley mainstays in the jazz world.
Danziger, whose Web site welcomes guests with a straightforward statement that begins "All I do is music," is a music teacher at the Powder Mill Middle School in Southwick, as well as a guitarist/vocalist with the long-running local swing and dance band The O-Tones.
Three years ago his bandmate (and Florence resident) Mary Witt suggested Danziger check out the Side Street Cafe and see if they were interested in having live music. Owner Patrick Shannon liked the idea, though the plans ended up being put on hold until this past March, when the series finally began.
"Pat offered the gig to me as a solo or duo gig," Danziger said. "I chose to do it as a duo because it provides more variety for the patrons, and it gives me the opportunity to play with a huge assortment of great local players."
Past performers have included guitarists Joe Belmont, Joe Boyle and Jack Pezanelli, keyboardists Jeff Holmes and Paul Arslanian and vocalists Barbara Ween, Lynne Meryl and Marion Groves. The diversity of the series has made room for vibraphonists, fiddlers, woodwind players of every kind, singer-songwriters and more, but with the restaurant's acoustically "lively" tin ceiling and hardwood floors, the musicians stay nice and mellow.
Keeping in mind the old saying, "When you want someone's attention, whisper," Danziger and friends keep the music on the quiet side. "There are two rooms. One room has music. In the other, the music is almost inaudible," he said. "The vibe is relaxed. The music is 50 percent background. The needs of the diners are primary. Those who want to talk can sit a little farther away, those who want to listen can be quite close," he added.
"When the room is full (which it usually is!) and there is a lot of talking, I do not try to fight the volume of the talking," he said. "I have found that a really delicious ballad, like ¿The Nearness of You,' done super quietly, will cast a spell on the room and tone it down. If the diners have been talking, and not clapping for the music, a ballad like that almost always gets their attention (in a nice way) and they respond with a lot of applause. Funny how that works ..."
If the guest musician has a repertoire that requires a lot of work to learn, Danziger studies hard when possible (as he did with a previous appearance by singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and member of the Lonesome Brothers Jim Armenti). Or he'll open up his seat to a musician more knowledgeable with the repertoire while he sits out with the audience, "taking notes and having an extra beer."
Besides all the work Danziger puts in before and during the shows, he's not done after everyone packs up and hits the road and the lights go off.
"I almost always record the gigs into my computer, multi-tracking. At the end of the gig, I go home and mix one or two songs before I go to bed, and send it to the email of the artist," he said. "By now I have amassed a HUGE collection of recordings which are too numerous for me to keep up with," Danziger said, adding that one day, with the permission of the respective artists, a compilation could be released.
As the weather gets even colder, the series will continue to bring some brightness to its nighttime corner of the world, and some upcoming guests include vocalist Ethel Lee on November 3 and vocalist Leah Kunkel on December 15.
For the most updated full list of performances at the Side Street Cafe, as well as plentiful sound files (which include at least one song from a previous SSC gig), visit Danziger's Web site at www.zackdanziger.com.

The Valley Advocate

SoundCheck: A Winter Solstice Plea”By Tom Sturm. Thursday, December 31, 2009
Zack Danziger's debut CD Sun Is All We Need often gives you the urge run playfully around a department store chasing a boyfriend or girlfriend as if you were in a made-for-TV montage. You picture the two of you sliding down escalator railings past startled old ladies with bags, darting hither and thither between the racks in the underwear section, comically spraying too much sampler in your face at the perfume counter and making funny faces at each other behind a crowd of unsuspecting shoppers standing in front of you in the elevator. It has a very"smooth jazz" feel at times, both vocally and instrumentally. That said, there is subtle, detail-oriented guitar work that's worthy of top-tier fusion players like Pat Metheny, Jeff Beck or Adrian Belew. A few of the gentler arpeggios even sound like they could be on a Radiohead album.
Some of the disc is fairly traditional-sounding, mid-20th century jazz, which showcases the backing players' considerable abilities. The flutes and saxophones are mighty impressive, ... Some of the tracks fall into Latin-esque feels, and others pedal on relaxed, brushed snare drum grooves. Layering dry, unison vocals, a doubling technique that's become popular again since the '90s recordings of artists like Beck and Elliot Smith, works very well on the softly sung melodies that prevail on the album. Lyrical content on these numbers is suitably cosmic.
Zack Danziger hosts a regular music series most Mondays and Tuesdays from 6 to 9 p.m. at Side Street Cafe in Florence that features a different guest artist each night.