Big Heart Machine, “Fanfares” from ‘Live at the Jazz Gallery’ (2020): Something Else! premiere

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When looking at Brian Krock’s bio it makes perfect sense that he would launch an eighteen piece jazz orchestra he dubbed Big Heart Machine a few years ago. After all, Krock is not merely a dedicated musician, composer and bandleader, but one with ambition and the gumption to execute: he once recorded an entire album of heavy-metal music he composed by himself while in the 7th grade.

Assembling a big band to perform creative modern jazz is probably a steeper mountain to climb, but he not only did it with aplomb for the band’s 2018 self-titled debut, he’s getting ready to do it again.



Live at the Jazz Gallery serves notice that the Big Heart Machine is an ongoing concern and also not some mere studio creation. Ahead of the album’s May 15, 2020 release, we’re offering a sneak peak with the world premiere of a performance from that album, “Fanfares.”

The cool thing about “Fanfares” is not because it’s a demonstration of Krock’s composing prowess this time, but rather, his interpretation prowess. This number is a piano etude that was penned by the Hungarian composer György Ligeti. Brian Krock does some real nifty tricks to the song, such as swinging the eight notes, but there’s way too much going on to explain in this space. Luckily, Krock himself takes the time to describe it in a very engaging way for this installment of his YouTube series, Score Study:

And this Brooklyn-based big band itself is hardly a bunch of nobodies; it’s composed of several leading lights of the younger NYC jazz generation such as Caroline Davis, Olli Hirvonen, Anna Webber, Charlotte Greve, Kenny Warren, Dave Adewumi, Timo Vollbrecht, and Chloe Rowlands.

Live at the Jazz Gallery is due out on May 15, 2020. Pre-order it now or purchase it from that date forward from Bandcamp. Oh, and to celebrate the release pandemic style, Big Heart Machine will live stream a Zoom listening party that day at 7 p.m. EST. Check it out.


S. Victor Aaron