Crawford & Crossley Quintet @ The Seen on Shaw Okanagan

Images of You is an album of ‘new jazz standards’ and is the first collaboration by Crawford&Crossley. Eight original tunes hit all the marks from blues to latin to swing, with Crawford’s excellent writing and Crossley’s lyrics brought to life by Yanti’s powerful vocal performances.

 

Larry Crawford has a long history in the Canadian jazz scene. As a studio musician in Winnipeg, he played on Sesame Street in the 1970’s. During his armed forces career he played around the world, toured with the Norad Band and played in pit bands for such notables as Sammy Davis Jr. and Liberace. Retiring to his hometown of Summerland in 1979, he has taught and influenced many jazz musicians over the years, including west coast musicians Campbell Ryga and Dennis Esson.

A prolific composer, he has written hundreds of tunes, and this collaboration brings some of those great tunes to light.

 

Allan Crossley began his career as a band teacher and is a self-confessed compulsive writer, penning lyrics for children’s songs, writing musicals, and dabbling in novels. His retirement goal was to devote more time to jazz piano. He regularly plays at a local restaurant and formed a quartet with Larry Crawford, Yanti, and Stefan Bienz in 2015. That provided the spark which led to the Images of You album which was released at The Dream Cafe in the spring of 2017.

 

Yanti is an in-demand ‘vocalist for hire’ who sings with an increasing number of Okanagan groups as well as doing solo performances with her ukulele.  When Yanti and her husband moved to the Sunny Okanagan from Texas in 2000, she never thought she’d be calling herself a musician.  In the summer 2012  Don Wade, Leader and Sax player of Sax Among Friends, “discovered” her talents while she was serving tables at the same restaurant where Don’s trio was playing.  “Do you know Summertime?”was all Yanti needed to hear to get her up to the mic and the rest, so to speak, is herstory…  Today, Larry and Allan say that her voice brings these compositions to life.

 

Stefan Bienz and Scott Gamble have played with almost everyone in the local music scene and regularly back visiting artists. Truly gifted musicians, they add their special touches to this album.