Following her 2022 Grammy nominated album, 12 Stars, Chilean tenor saxophonist, Melissa Aldana, is releasing her second Blue Note Records album Echoes Of The Inner Prophet!
Born in Santiago, Chile, Aldana first began playing the saxophone at the age of six, under the influence of her father, professional saxophonist, Marcos Aldana.
Influenced by the likes of Cannonball Adderley, Michael Brecker, and Charlie Parker, Aldana initially began on the alto saxophone. Upon hearing Sonny Rollins, however, she made the switch to her now ubiquitous tenor sax.
Touring throughout Santiago as a teenager, Aldana had a chance meeting with Panamanian keyboardist, Danilo Pérez, as he was touring Chile in 2005. Pérez invited the then seventeen-year-old to perform at his festival, Panama Jazz Festival, as well as audition at various US music schools.
As a result of these auditions, Aldana began studying at Berklee College of Music in Boston, graduating in 2009, and relocating to New York City to study under George Coleman, best known for his work with Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock.
Her first album, Free Fall, was released in 2011, shortly followed by 2012’s Second Cycle. In 2013, aged twenty-four, she was the first female musician, the first South American person, and the youngest person to win the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition, in which her father had been a semi-finalist in 1991.
In 2012, she formed the group Melissa Aldana & Crash Trio, featuring Cuban drummer Francisco Mela, and Chilean bassist and old friend, Pablo Menares. The trio released two albums in 2012 and 2016, the former, self-titled, being on the Concord Jazz label.
On her newest Blue Note Records release, Echoes Of The Inner Prophet documents the evolution of her quintet — Lage Lund (guitar, arranger, co-producer); Fabian Almazan, (piano); Pablo Menares (bass); Kush Abadey (drums) — capturing the collective insight they’ve garnered after extensive touring and travel.
As Aldana explains, this album reflects her “personal journey, with an especially introspective point of view. The inner prophet is my own self, now older, who has the knowledge and the intuition and the truth about what my path should be.”
The 8-track set of original compositions includes 6 new pieces by Aldana that seek profound truths through introspection, intuition, and self-reflection, including the opening title track being dedicated to Wayne Shorter.
