Bonsai Music
May 28, 2021
When Grammy winning multi-instrumentalist producer, singer-songwriter Leo Sidran wrote the song “Trying Times” in early 2020, he had no idea just how prescient it would turn out to be. The song, like Leo himself, sat somewhere between jazz, singer-songwriter, and pop music, and spoke simply to the complexity of the moment: “You have to laugh just to keep from crying but it’s not so funny, these are trying times.”
Then came Covid. Sidran settled into domestic life, and set about writing a collection of songs that offered an intimate look into family life during the pandemic year, The Art Of Conversation. As they say, the personal is universal, and these songs are familiar, introspective portraits that reflect a feeling that so many of us can relate to today.
Musically, much of the record rests on a foundation of Sidran’s one-man-band production style of playing drums, bass, guitar, keyboards, vibraphone, and singing. But incredibly, the record also counts on over 60 collaborators….
The Art Of Conversation is Sidran’s 7th solo album and follows his celebrated 2018 release Cool School [The Music of Michael Franks]. Like Michael Franks, Leo’s music borrows from both jazz and songwriting traditions; it lives somewhere in between. And both Franks and Sidran share a love of Brazilian music. Nowhere is that made more clear than on the title track “The Art Of Conversation”, a bossa nova duet sung between Leo and celebrated jazz vocalist Kat Edmonson.
Tracklist
1. Wake up Soso
2. Body and the Brain
3. Row On (feat. Jorge Drexler)
4. Pop
5. Trying Times
6. Georgette
7. My Baby Doesn't Say Goodnight
8. Song for a Sucker Like You
9. This Is Night in Brooklyn
10. The Art of Conversation (feat. Kat Edmonson)
11. Together with You
12. Northern Lights
