FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION: 62nd GRAMMY AWARDS
Best Contemporary Instrumental Album: Planet D’earth (feat. John D’earth)
Best Instrumental Composition: “Dear John” (feat. Bob Mintzer) from Planet D’earth by Kait Dunton
Kait’s 6th album as a leader features trumpeter John D’earth in a quartet setting with Dane Alderson on bass and Jake Reed on drums. Bob Mintzer joins on tenor sax for three tracks. “If not for John D’earth, Kait might never have become a professional musician. So it’s only appropriate that her sixth album, Planet D’earth, is both a collaboration with and a musical letter of gratitude to the man who changed the trajectory of her life…”
Released Feb 8, 2019 on Real & Imagined Music, Planet D’earth (feat. John D’earth) reached #9 on JazzWeek and was featured on Tom Schnabel’s KCRW Rhythm Planet. All original music by Kait Dunton, plus three songs by John D’earth.
Recorded at Sphere Studios in Los Angeles by Rich Breen with additional recording by Jake Reed at The Mountain View Studio in South Pasadena.
Engineered by Rich Breen and Jake Reed. Mixed & mastered by Rich Breen.
Produced by Kait Dunton.
Kait Dunton, piano, Fender Rhodes
John D'earth, trumpet, flugelhorn
Dane Alderson, electric bass
Jake Reed, drums, percussion
Also featuring: Bob Mintzer, tenor sax (tracks 1, 3 + 5)
Planet D’earth is a collection of new compositions based less on a specific sound than on an idea, an exploration of John D’earth as man and musician. “John is very much interested in the meaning of music, the emotion or story behind it, so this felt like the right approach,” Dunton says. She used facets of D’earth’s personality and playing style as inspiration to guide the listener on a journey, from fun and adventurous to moody and minimalist. Apropos of the concept, D’earth also contributed three songs.
For those familiar with Dunton’s ongoing band, trioKAIT, Planet D’earth is a sojourn from the signature style she’s created. “A large focus for trioKAIT is having a tight sound as a band,” Dunton explains. “This project is more exploratory, more contemplative. My focus was on storytelling and compositional style.”
That style, a study in counterpoint and balance, gave Dunton an opportunity to assemble a group of interconnected musicians for something more meaningful than just a studio date. Grammy Award- winning saxophonist Bob Mintzer joins D’earth on a recording for the first time, but the two have been friends since the 1970s, when they performed together for a summer in the Catskills. Dane Alderson, on electric bass, not only plays with Mintzer in the jazz- fusion band Yellowjackets, he lives in Charlottesville, where he and D’earth often share the stage. Drummer Jake Reed (also the rhythmic identity of trioKAIT) is married to Dunton, and they both know Mintzer from their music studies at the University of Southern California, where Mintzer teaches.
For Dunton, all these threads add up to another thematic element. Throughout her career, she’s sought to grow and evolve, to clarify her musical voice. This album is a chance to pause and reflect—in a way, to move at once backward and forward. It’s an acknowledgement of who she was and who she’s become. On Planet D’earth, Dunton spins at the core, the source of gravity pulling together people who affected her transformation.
-Jason S. Dennis
About Kait Dunton:
KAIT DUNTON is a Los Angeles based composer & pianist with an unconventional approach to composition and to the piano trio, best expressed by her genre-pushing super group, trioKAIT. Kait’s innovative compositions shuffle wide-ranging influences into a refreshingly modern take on instrumental music that is as uncategorizable as it is infectious.
Kait Dunton has produced and released five albums of original compositions, with a sixth featuring her inventive arranging style. Her latest album, Planet D’earth, reached #9 on the JazzWeek charts and was featured on Tom Schnabel’s KCRW Rhythm Planet. In 2018, DownBeat awarded 4.5 stars to Kait’s latest trio album, trioKAIT 2, writing that “Dunton brings a Technicolor sensibility to everything she touches.” In 2017, trioKAIT Casual reached #5 on the Jazz Week radio charts, while her debut album, Real & Imagined, continues to draw fans, now with nearly 2 million streams on Spotify. Her third record, trioKAIT, made the Huffington Post’s list of “The Best Jazz for 2015”. Prior to this, Kait was a member of Snarky Puppy during their formative years in Texas, appearing on their sophomore record, The World is Getting Smaller.
In addition to composition and performance, Kait is also an active recording artist and educator. She records often for film, television and other artists, and recently served as the inaugural chair of the new Piano Department at Los Angeles College of Music (LACM) in Pasadena, CA.