Spectrum

Liner Notes

A Belgian gentleman invented the saxophone.
But God commanded the crafting of trumpets:
“In the desert, the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:
Have two silver trumpets (hatzotzrot) made.
Make them of hammered metal…

When both trumpets are blown in long blasts,
the whole community shall assemble at the Tent of Meeting.

But when the trumpeters sound short blasts, the people will break camp, and move forward.”
Numbers 10:1-6

The sounds of trumpets express God’s spectrum of intent for humanity:
The trumpets’ long blasts call people to gather, united, in focused stillness,
at the Music Hall of Meaning.  

Why sit and listen? To absorb inspiration to live loving and ethical and productive lives.  
Inspiration from whom?  From artful voices, amplifying Divine harmonics.  

But you’re not meant to sit for long: 
The trumpets’ short blasts rouse people to move, together, in pursuit of the purposes of freedom.

The ancient unchanging text commands us to use that unchanging text, to change.
Across the working spectrum of his virtuosic valves, 
Aaron Janik’s trumpet lives up to the intent of its ancient source: common sense revolution.  

Especially over more complex changes, young Aaron improvises with an old master’s trademark touch.  Aaron excites the ear yet makes the art of excitement sound easy. And that’s why you want to absorb each chord change across Janik’s Spectrum, whose ellipse encompasses both Kepler’s Constant and Rubik’s Cube: a cosmographic scientist at play. From the meditative to the metal, this man’s horn invents new ways of belonging to tradition.

In the desert year of the pandemic, Aaron Janik’s trumpeting roused musicians to rise tall in their lonesome tents and blow until the constricting walls of forced refuge crumbled.  A simple cure for isolation just might be collaboration. Join together to liberate each other. So Aaron prescribed.  

At Oberlin, he had mastered biology and aced the MCATS.  Proof that his beloved mother Dana embraced Aarons decision to follow his musical passion is displayed, cut by cut, in her paint pour depictions of an ever changing planet.  (Look close for the grooves of the vinyl Dana used as her canvas.)

In his Oberlin years, Aaron was a central participant in one of most astounding gangs of musicians ever to play house parties on a college campus, and many of these serious players contribute to this album:  Detroit legend De’Sean Jones; New Orleans mainstay Shea Pierre; Alex Cummings, Peter Manheim, Russell Gelman-Sheehan, and Dan Pappalardo (New York City; ) Matt Gold (Chicago); Zaire Darden (Ohio); Conrad Reeves, Chase Jackson, Jake Silverman, and Ian McArdle (LA, SF).  Matt Adomeit joined without leaving Berlin. Sullivan Fortner and Mike King were mainstays of that Oberlin crowd.  You won’t hear them here, but try the Vanguard or the Hebrew Union College soup kitchen.  (Wish now that you hadn’t chosen your college for its football culture?)

Point by point on the spectrum of musical skills, Chase Jackson arcs among the most important of them all.  An all-world vibraphonist. A stellar pianist, guitarist, and bass player to boot. A master of the computer in music production.  Aaron’s ears designed this album, and Chase’s ears responded with rare skill to Aaron’s directives.  Together they repurpose R&B production techniques, trace across time from low-fi to high.  But those tradesmen’s tricks are a gesture of hospitality, a comfort intended to encourage you inward, where rare electric ideas might challenge you to change.

On first listen, let the HornFX flood over you. Turn off the lights, or tilt your shades back up your nose, and imagine a script for this cinematography. These sounds set scenes.  

Next time round, parse the sound.  Yes, when Aaron’s horn is up front, you might be amazed by his inventive precision.  But sometimes that dexterity is mixed deep, his trumpet only meant to be felt.

And remember:  At their core, these are real instruments, played with fingers and breath.  And soul.

Aaron and his Oberlin comrade Douglas Levin have earned an international reputation as experts in deploying electronic pedals to enhance the sounds of horns.  They have taught at Berklee, Peabody Institute of Music, Cal Arts, etc.  Major jazz players call Aaron and Doug for guidance in shaping the spectrum of sonic textures they hope to deliver.  The Dave Matthews Band’s horn section plays through a HornFX-designed and crafted pedalboard.  Trumpet great Sean Jones electrifies stages around the world with his own HornFX pedalboard. Aaron and Doug have written a guidebook to pedals for horns, The HornFX Pedal Encyclopedia, published on their web site:  www.horn-fx.com

Online life can be dull or destructive.  For this album, the online wilderness was sacred ground.
The pandemic suspended touring. 
But around this country, great players became ready and available to record.

Beyond the Oberlin influence, you can map Aaron’s American geography in the styles and substance of others’ superb labor on the transcontinental architecture of Janik’s Spectrum. Oberlin comrade De’Sean Jones, saxophonist, was the magnet who drew Aaron to Detroit for three years.  The close musical relationships of those Detroit years can be savored here in the playing of bassist Ronald CJay Alexander, drummer Joe Otis, and the mighty De’Sean.  

Of enduring meaning from the midwest life is the friendship between Aaron and South Bend songwriter and producer Micki Miller, who proves a significant light on Spectrum, along with her collaborators Blanche J (vocals), Dirk Hines (bass), and Wally Norris (drums).

From Detroit, Aaron then motored west to secure a master’s degree in jazz performance from USC (home of historic football and major league musicianship).  

Coastal by address but central on Spectrum, from the California life come the guitar of Colin Cook and the drumming of Thomas Pridgen, who headline a stellar contingent of California contributors:  vocal stylist Danielle Wertz, rapper Wonway Posibul,  the prodigious trombones of Ido Meshulam and Paul Nelson, saxophone aces Katisse Buckingham and David Binney, superb pianists Javi Santiago, Nick Lamb and Jacob Mann, bass heroes Joe Cleveland and Giulio Xavier Cetto, and drumming savant Gene Coye.

And another shade of amazing on Janik’s Spectrum, now wowing Texas churches, by way of Long Island, keyboardist Quennel Gaskin has made professional players roll on the floor in humble disbelief.

Aaron’s musicianship has been inspired and refined, directly, through each of these relationships and seasons of shared experience.  Within these deep musical friendships echo the secrets of Spectrum’s architecture.

Listen for the performance of these major musicians, and for the subtleties and the roar of the pedals, most prominently, on these tunes:

track 2:  Focus on what seems a long synthesizer solo, but is actually Aaron’s trumpet, in the title tune, Spectrum.

track 8:  Inferno’s instrumentation consists of only four upright basses, four trombones, and two trumpets.  All of those background pads are actually one trumpet signal turned into large and dense harmonies.  

track 17:  Skyscraper features a trumpet-blended-with-synth solo.

HornFX explorers will find effects adventures in Friends (track 4), Sedate (track 6), Reason(able) (track 10), Valve Slapper (track 13), Coconut Ice Cream (track 14) and Hardcore Parkour! (track 15).

The primary sound of this record, sensibilities of modern jazz fusion infused into metal, rock, trap, and R&B, come alive in the tracks Spectrum, Sedate, Reason(able), and Skyscraper.  Across Janik’s Spectrum appear compositions which affirm that the trumpet, type as a genre-specific instrument, can and will contribute positively to any genre of music:  Runnin’ with the Sun (neo-soul), Sedate (metal), Begin Again (rap/hip hop), Tongariro (classical Sunday afternoon), Waste No Time (R&B), Valve Slapper (8-bit video game music), Yellow Tux (Herb Alpert-esque), and Friends (Latin).

A track, in the language of Janik’s Spectrum, is a whole song.  A stem is a filament of sound which is woven into song.  Some of these tracks have well over two hundred individual stems of music.  Reason to sit still and listen.  Inspiration to move, in pursuit of freedom.

The same God who said let there be light also said: Play me some trumpet.
Time to leave your tent and gather at the Music Hall of Meaning.  
Aaron Janik plays like he’s the house trumpeter in heaven.

Written by Rabbi Harry Levin

Album artwork by Dana Janik

Album Credits

Track 1 - Fab Lyfe

Chase Jackson - production, guitar, bass, keys
Aaron Janik - vocals, trumpet, production

Track 2 - Spectrum

Chase Jackson - production, vibraphone, keys
Javi Santiago - piano, synths
Colin Cook - guitar, production
Giulio Xavier Cetto - bass
Thomas Pridgen - drums
Aaron Janik - synth solo, trumpet, flugelhorn, production

Track 3 - Runnin’ with the Sun

Danielle Wertz - vocals
Nick Lamb - production, keys
Chase Jackson - production
Aaron Janik - flugelhorn (solo), production

Track 4 - Friends

De’Sean Jones - tenor saxophone
Quennel Gaskin - keys
Chase Jackson - vibraphone, production
Ronald CJay Alexander - bass
Gene Coye - drums
Peter Manheim - percussion
Aaron Janik - trumpet (solo)

Track 5 - Not Leavin’

Micki Miller - vocals
Chase Jackson - production, keys
Ronald CJay Alexander - bass
Aaron Janik - flugelhorn, production

Track 6 - Sedate

Colin Cook - guitar (solo), production
Chase Jackson - vibraphone, production
Giulio Xavier Cetto - bass
Thomas Pridgen - drums
Aaron Janik - trumpet, synths, production

Track 7 - Yellow Tuxedo

Sam Greenfield - Alto Sax (solo)
Ido Meshulam - Trombone (solo)
Chase Jackson - keys, production
Jacob Mann - keys
Colin Cook - guitar
Joe Cleveland - bass
Gene Coye - drums
Aaron Janik - flugelhorn (solo), production

Track 8 - Inferno

Paul Nelson - trombone/bass trombone
Matt Adomeit - upright basses
Chase Jackson - production, keys
Mike Quigg - drums
Aaron Janik - trumpet (solo), pedal choir, producer

Track 9 - Begin Again (Page 1 of 2)

Wonway Posibul - rapper, songwriter
Micki Miller - vocals
Chase Jackson - production, guitar, keys
Ronald CJay Alexander - bass
Joe Otis - drums
Aaron Janik - trumpet, producer