Sony label OKeh has announced the signing of Israeli bassist Avishai Cohen.
The latest jazz musician to be signed under their expansive marketing umbrella following on from an announcement within the last month that German trumpeter Till Brönner will also newly record for the major’s Masterworks imprint, Okeh say, while details are strictly limited, that Cohen “will record his first album for Sony Classical scheduled for spring 2017” in what they are calling “an exclusive long term” deal.
Cohen, who is 46, was born in Israel and lived in the US mid west as a young man later making his name in New York, after studying at the New School, playing with Panamanian pianist Danilo Pérez and also with jazz piano icon Chick Corea before becoming an acclaimed solo artist in his own right developing a big following all over Europe particularly in France and more widely on the transcontinental festival circuit. His regular shows at Ronnie Scott’s have attracted big turn outs and he has made the transition on the London music scene to bigger venues playing the Barbican with a number of projects spanning folk and chamber projects extending his trio to more elaborately arranged settings.
Read a review of Cohen’s 2015 release From Darkness here, a live review from 2014 here and an interview the same year conducted with Cohen when he released his album Almah during his brief spell with the Warner-owned Parlophone. Cohen, who also sings, is one of the most innovative high energy jazz bassists playing today, and was a formative influence on the award-winning UK/Scandinavian band Phronesis and particularly the band’s leader Jasper Høiby, and he has a raft of high profile appearances in the US and Europe coming up this summer.