Historicity (2009)

ACT Music presents Vijay Iyer's newest project, a trio album combining his searing originals with a surprising batch of covers: Bernstein's "Somewhere," Andrew Hill's "Smoke Stack," M.I.A.'s "Galang," and others. Featuring his longtime collaborators, Marcus Gilmore (drums) and Stephan Crump (bass). Release date: August 28 (Europe) / October 13, 2009 (USA).

***** (highest rating) - Concerto Magazine, Austria

"Presto! Here is the great new jazz piano trio."
(New York Times)

"Truly astonishing... they make challenging music sound immediately enjoyable. "
(National Public Radio)

"A jewel... 9 out of 10"
(PopMatters.com)

"Historicity hangs together beautifully: it's one of 2009's gems."
- iTunes Review

#1 JAZZ ALBUM OF 2009
NPR, Chicago Tribune, PopMatters

BEST JAZZ ALBUMS OF 2009
East Bay Express, Jazz.com, AllAboutJazz NY

Tragicomic (2008)

Sunnyside presents Vijay's long-awaited new quartet disc, his first since 2005's universally acclaimed Reimagining. Featuring the same longstanding ensemble (Iyer, saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa, bassist Stephan Crump, and drummer Marcus Gilmore), the album includes ten Iyer originals and two surprising covers: a rhythmically charged dub version of Bud Powell's "Comin' Up" and a solo rendition of the standard "I'm All Smiles." Released April 22, 2008.

Voted among the BEST ALBUMS OF 2008 in the Village Voice, Chicago Reader, All About Jazz, Chicago Tribune, NPR, Jazzman, Jazz Journalists Association, and many others.

"**** (4 stars out of 4) ...a near-certainty to be acclaimed as one of the best jazz discs of the year... starkly beautiful and powerful... one of the most powerful quartets in all of emergent jazz." - Jeff Simon, Buffalo News

"a strikingly original pianistic voice... 'Tragicomic' is another stellar installment in his oeuvre... a marriage of intellect and power, of brains and brawn... This is highfalutin jazz, and it swings madly." - Steve Greenlee, JazzTimes

"[P]ianist Vijay Iyer is on his way to becoming one of the major jazz voices of his generation... 'Tragicomic' is the most openhearted of Iyer's instrumental albums and, perhaps not coincidentally, the most unabashedly emotional." - Charles Farrell, emusic.com

"Iyer brings a visionary sensibility to his projects, always capturing the prevailing zeitgeist... A stunning achievement, 'Tragicomic' is one of the year's best albums." - Troy Collins, AllAboutJazz.com

Door (2008)

Praised on NPR's Fresh Air as "a jazz power trio for the new century," FIELDWORK makes its most powerful and fiercely imagined statement to date with Door, their third album for Pi Recordings. An important marker in this New York collective's ongoing evolution, Door documents three years of intense collaboration since Simulated Progress (2005), and is their first Fieldwork recording to feature the jaw-dropping contributions of Tyshawn Sorey, drummer/composer/co-leader of Fieldwork since 2005. Rounded out by saxophonist/composer Steve Lehman and pianist/composer Vijay Iyer, Fieldwork reflects and refracts the American jazz tradition, modern composition, African and South Asian musics, underground hip-hop and electronica, and the influential music of Chicago's A.A.C.M. The resulting blend is "rich in paradox: dark yet uplifting, intellectually demanding yet effortlessly funky." - JazzTimes. Released April 22, 2008.

"BEST ALBUMS OF 2008 - Philadelphia City Paper, others."

"There's a profound sense of trust, shared values, and -- above all -- the art of communication... A phenomenal concept brought fully to fruition by these incredible, challenging, forward-thinking musicians." - Michael Nastos, All Music Guide

"staggeringly good" - Charles Farrell, emusic.com

Still Life with Commentator (2007)

Savoy Jazz presents the album version of the critically acclaimed oratorio about tv news, the blogosphere, and life during wartime, by composer-pianist Vijay Iyer and poet-performer Mike Ladd. Also featuring Pamela Z, Guillermo E. Brown, Liberty Ellman, Okkyung Lee, Palina Jonsdottir, and Masayasu Nakanishi. Co-produced by Scotty Hard. Original theatrical version conceived and directed by Ibrahim Quraishi. Released March 6, 2007.

"...these Iyer-Ladd creations are unfailingly imaginative and significant... Still Life is awash in "post-human" beatmaking but often pulses with lyricism. Ladd's delivery is throaty, peculiar in the best sense, a hip-hop vernacular with highbrow dimension. Iyer's deserved acclaim as a jazz composer and pianist also makes him noteworthy in a wider world of art... By refusing categorization in an overly rigid jazz field, these musicians further jazz's purposes by ingraining its sensibility among different publics -- one important way for the music to operate in the 21st century." - JazzTimes

"The libretto's tone often ricochets between elegiac and sardonic, with allusions ranging from Abu Ghraib to Dr. Phil. Much of the music is laptop-generated, a swirl of ominous textures and hypnotic rhythms... these elements commingle suggestively.
...the piece, with its uneasy resonances, holds up a fun-house mirror to our culture of information overload. And somehow the results are not just galling, but also often gripping. Like the subject of its critique, it draws you in." - The New York Times

Raw Materials (2006)

The long-awaited duo album on Savoy Jazz, created by the two longtime collaborators Vijay Iyer (piano, compositions) & Rudresh Mahanthappa (alto saxophone, compositions). Released May 23, 2006.

BEST JAZZ ALBUMS OF 2006 - Village Voice, JazzTimes

**** (4 stars) "Although Raw Materials is the work of a duo, there's more detail here than you'll find from most combos double or triple its size. An auspicious debut." - Downbeat

" their most striking collaboration yet. A series of confident duets, the set combines stateliness with rawness... It's like seeing two sides of the same coin." - Time Out New York

"a fascinating look into a unique contemporary musical dialogue... [V]ery few recordings reveal such a richness or complexity of emotion -- and continue to reveal more of these qualities listen after listen." - All About Jazz

Reimagining (2005)

Vijay Iyer's exhilarating debut on Savoy Jazz, featuring powerful new music for his longstanding quartet (Iyer, piano; Rudresh Mahanthappa, alto saxophone; Stephan Crump, bass; Marcus Gilmore, drums). Capped off with a radical solo piano version of John Lennon's "Imagine." Released May 17, 2005.

BEST JAZZ ALBUMS OF 2005 - Slate, ArtForum, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun-Times, Village Voice, JazzTimes

**** (4 stars) - Downbeat

"an organic, austere consistency of vision and accomplishment that's simply stunning... The quartet achieves an internal sympathy and rapport that's unsurpassed by any working jazz group today." - All About Jazz

"Iyer plays with a ringing bell-like tone that recalls both McCoy Tyner and Nina Simone at her most wrought, then drops small descending chords like blessings... The music conveys a narrative quality that's very much driven by the leader that combines with a strong lyrical sense to create intensely engaging music." - Signal to Noise

"Here is a musician who is discovering as he goes, one who never gives in to notions of excess or mere vanguard speculation, but who moves purposefully into the process of discovery. And jazz is better for it. Reimagining is the sound of the mature Iyer, who is at once authoritative and inquisitive, finding and relating mystery as he uncovers it and, in the process, furthering the jazz tradition. Bravo." - All Music Guide

Simulated Progress (2005)

The groundbreaking second album by the collective trio Fieldwork, featuring Vijay Iyer, Steve Lehman, and Elliot Kavee. Released July 19, 2005.

"A JAZZ POWER TRIO FOR THE NEW CENTURY." - NPR's Fresh Air

"a dazzling, intrepid sort of new jazz that's as deeply interactive as anything you're likely to hear this year... an unwavering unity of sonic purpose and attack... there is nothing else out there that sounds like it... In its risk-taking, fragility, and fearlessness, it's also very thrilling." - All About Jazz

"dazzling dialogues that aim equally for listeners' feet and minds. Together, they create intensely rhythmic music that combines jazz ingenuity, rock velocity and World Music savvy. Their visceral compositions constantly blur the lines between improvised flights of fancy and expertly calibrated arrangements... The result is a heady, punchy outing that could serve as a template for daring, forward-looking musicians everywhere." - San Diego Union-Tribune

"Fieldwork is the sound of jazz exploding and raining down shards of glass upon our heads." - Prefix Magazine

In What Language? (2004)

Vijay Iyer's genre-defying collaboration with poet/hip-hop artist Mike Ladd is a series of monologues by people of color navigating the hyper-globalized setting of an international airport. Featuring an eleven-member ensemble of musicians and speaking voices, this is the album version of the acclaimed multi-media performance piece of the same name. Co-produced by Scotty Hard. Released January 2004.

"...it's that elusive thing, underground political music that sounds good... a breakthrough hip-hop-jazz fusion... it's one of the smartest I've heard, and one of the few that really works." - Ben Ratliff, The New York Times

"...a monumental work that seamlessly combines sound and voice for an artistic statement that should reverberate for years to come... simply a masterpiece" - Signal to Noise

****1/2 (4 1/2 stars, out of 5) - Downbeat

CHOC [highest rating] - Jazzman

#1 ALBUM OF THE YEAR - Jazzwise

"The great success of 'In What Language?' can be measured by the seamlessness with which Ladd's verse meets Iyer's music. The strength of their collaborative efforts can hardly be overstated... The marriage of sound and word are so complete that it becomes impossible to imagine one component of the project without the other... a tour de force... Steeped in the language of South Asian and pan-African culture but trafficking in universal impulses..." - JazzTimes

"...an ambitious protest for a belittling time... The airport, with its relentless energy of coming and going, is the perfect site for the pair's commentary on lives in transition... The music - composed by Iyer and performed by a seven-piece band - glides and swirls with a thick, heartening spirit. Ladd's characters are complicated, and though they emphasize the uniqueness of their positions, there's always something open, even affirming, about them... In What Language? succeeds by not wearing its political views on its sleeve but offering them slyly, through the feeling the performance evokes." - The Village Voice

Bloodsutra (2003)

The Vijay Iyer Quartet's stunning follow-up to Panoptic Modes was listed among the best albums of the year in JazzTimes and many other publications. Originally released October 2003 on Artists House and now carried by Pi Recordings.

Personnel: V. Iyer, piano, compositions; Rudresh Mahanthappa, alto saxophone; Stephan Crump, bass; Tyshawn Sorey, drums.

"The cohesive group's ethos is at once reflective and kinetic... This is exciting and eminently listenable stuff, intuitive in bearing and dynamic in execution. An essential for adventurous listeners, [it] could also serve as an ideal introduction to Iyer's burgeoning oeuvre." - JazzTimes

"...raises Iyer's writing and playing to the next level... Blood Sutra finds him engaging in sharply diverse but well-balanced forms on each track - and coming up a winner every time... Not simply a great jazz record, Blood Sutra is a statement of purpose from an artist whose youth stands in contrast to his irrefutable skill." - Jazziz

"Blood Sutra is a terrifically challenging record. But challenging music is often the most rewarding, and this suite of 12 perfectly interlocking songs follows through on that promise... Iyer's compositions are moving jazz in a new direction." - The Colorado Springs Independent

Your Life Flashes (2002)

Debut of the collaborative trio project Fieldwork, featuring Iyer, saxophonist Aaron Stewart, and drummer Elliot Kavee

"a terrific disc, filled with vibrant playing and wondrous ideas" - The Boston Globe

"terse, spellbinding miniatures that never stand still" - The Village Voice

"Fieldwork is doing an excellent job of immersing itself in the music's most primal and essential elements...the exploration of rhythm in an intimate and intensely purposeful dialogue." - Billboard

Panoptic Modes (2001)

High-energy quartet music with Rudresh Mahanthappa, Stephan Crump, and Derrek Phillips. This cd was chosen as one of the best jazz albums of 2001 in The New Yorker and The Village Voice.

"sends a ripple through the jazz universe" - modernjazz.com

"Iyer's spiky chords, precise phrasing, and surprising linear improvisations are consistently compelling... This band glows with purpose." - Gary Giddins, Village Voice

"FOUR STARS...a music so rhythmically gripping and harmonically provocative that one hardly can wait to hear what outlandish ideathese players will hit upon next... 'Panoptic Modes' offers a sensuousness of sound and vividness of performances thatwill seduce even the casual listener." - Howard Reich, Los Angeles Times

Architextures (1998)

original music for trio, octet, & solo piano. With Rudresh Mahanthappa, Aaron Stewart, Eric Crystal, Liberty Ellman, Jeff Brock, Kevin Ellington Mingus, and Brad Hargreaves.

"utterly remarkable... rhythmically challenging, smartly composed, and burns through with passionate playing and improvisation" - sonicnet.com (top 10 list for 2000)

"genius... epitomizing new jazz at its best." - San Francisco Bay Guardian

"bracingly expressionist jazz... full of pulsating blues" - New York Times

Memorophilia (1995)

solo piano, trio, quartets, quintet. With Steve Coleman, Francis Wong, George Lewis, Kash Killion, Liberty Ellman, Jeff Bilmes, Elliot Kavee, Jeff Brock, and Brad Hargreaves.

"vibrant with an Ellingtonian elegance... thoughtfully conceived and gorgeously executed." - The Montclarion

"one of the most outstanding examples of original contemporary jazz I can remember hearing in a long, long while... The music is not your typical straight-ahead jazz jam session. It is a work of art with orchestral balance and dignity." - Jazz Friends Review

"One of the best albums of 1996" - Cadence magazine editor Bob Rusch

"One of the 15 most interesting sounds of the decade!" - A. Magazine