Artemis Honors Wayne Shorter With Stunning New Version Of ‘Penelope’
The band’s reimagining of Shorter’s beautiful ballad also features on their new Blue Note album ‘In Real Time’
Artemis honors the legendary Wayne Shorter with a stunning new version of his beautiful ballad “Penelope.” The piece, which was first recorded in 1965 for Shorter’s Blue Note album Etcetera, was arranged by the band’s pianist and musical director Renee Rosnes. You can check the track out below.
“Wayne Shorter was a musical genius, a visionary thinker, and a magical improviser who knew no creative bounds,” says Rosnes. “He immortalized many women–family members, friends and great women of history alike–through his compositions including “Ana Maria,” “Iska,” “Miyako,” “Joanna’s Theme,” “Aung San Suu Kyi,” “Sacagawea,” “The Three Marias,” “Midnight in Carlotta’s Hair,” “Marie Antoinette,” and “Nefertiti.” The haunting melody of “Penelope” has a sound of inevitability and there’s an emotional weight to every melodic and harmonic choice. We will miss Wayne so much. He left great beauty in this world.”
“Penelope” is the closing track of Artemis’new album In Real Time, the follow-up to the band’s acclaimed 2020 self-titled debut. The album presents a new lineup of the collective with founding members—Rosnes, trumpeter Ingrid Jensen, bassist Noriko Ueda, and drummer Allison Miller—joined by newcomers Nicole Glover on tenor saxophone and Alexa Tarantino on alto saxophone, soprano saxophone, and flute. The 8-song set, which showcases both the improvisational strength of its members and their respective gifts as composers, was introduced last month with Ueda’s brightly swinging lead single “Lights Away From Home.”
Artemis play the following tour dates:
April 20 – Weis Center for the Performing Arts – Lewisburg, PA
April 23 – Campbell Hall – Santa Barbara, CA
May 4 – New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival – New Orleans, LA
May 21 – Ravenscroft Center for the Performing Arts – Scottsdale, AZ
July 9 – North Sea Jazz Festival – Rotterdam, Netherlands
July 11 – Barbican Hall – London, England
July 14 – Musiques en été – Geneva, Switzerland
July 17 – Jazz a Toulon – Toulon, France
Sept. 26-30 – Birdland Jazz Club – New York, NY
Jan. 18-25, 2024 – The Jazz Cruise
May 31-June 1, 2024 – The Appel Room at Jazz at Lincoln Center – New York, NY
