| Jazz |
Once again, Resonance Records delivers what can only be called a landmark album. We admire musicians for many different reasons, but on rare occasions an artist’s very differences prove to be his most defining strength. Such is the case with Eddie Daniels, who has long been as comfortable in the world of classical music as he is in jazz. His latest project, To Milton with Love, pays tribute to the Brazilian composer and singer Milton Nascimento.
This release marks Daniels’s third homage to a Brazilian legend, following Heart of Brazil: A Tribute to Egberto Gismont, a 2018 Grammy nominee, and Night Kisses: A Tribute to Ivan Lins in 2020. Daniels’s versatility as both clarinetist and saxophonist underscores his unique ability to cross stylistic borders with grace.
The late jazz critic Leonard Feather once wrote of Daniels: “It is rare that a single man can reinvent an instrument and carry it to the next stage of revolution.” That observation remains strikingly true. Daniels’s ton, precise, warm, instantly recognizabl, comes alive from the very first notes, demonstrating an elasticity and freedom that are uniquely his own.
Nascimento himself has been a source of fascination for generations of artists, his voice and compositions carving an indelible place in the history of Brazilian music. Master of samba and beyond, he is here reimagined through Daniels’s lens, with elegance and reverence. To Milton with Love gathers an ensemble of Daniels’s longtime collaborator, guitarist Anthony Wilson, pianist Josh Nelson, bassist Kevin Axt, and drummer Ray Brinke, augmented by the Lyris String Quartet, with lush arrangements by Kuno Schmid and Nelson. Together, they revisit Courage, Nascimento’s second studio album, originally produced in 1969 by Creed Taylor for CTI Records, with contributions from Herbie Hancock and Eumir Deodato.
But To Milton with Love is not merely a musical achievement. The 16-page booklet includes liner notes by writer James Gavin, and the project itself bears the mark of producer George Klabin, Resonance’s founder and co-president. Klabin conceived the idea decades after a chance encounter with Nascimento in a small New York jazz club in 1969. That same year he purchased Courage, which remains, more than half a century later, his favorite recording.
The album unfolds like a mural in eleven movements. One cannot help but imagine its pieces weaving together a story, whether shared between musician and producer, or drawn from Nascimento’s own artistic journey.
The listener is led through a tapestry of eras and influences, while Daniels’s genius lies in the way he orchestrates sound itself: his command of rhythm and architecture leaves nothing to chance, constructing a complex yet fluid edifice of music that both dazzles and delights.
Daniels’s classical training lends the project additional weight. Nowhere is this more evident than in his handling of the strings: their presence is never ornamental but integral, managed with the kind of insight that comes only from decades of concert experience. This fusion of traditions gives the record its richness, layers upon layers that reveal new subtleties with each listen.
To Milton with Love is, in the end, a luminous work: inventive, intelligent, and brimming with meaning. It is a tribute that shines like sunlight in today’s musical landscape, reaffirming Eddie Daniels as a true magician of sound.
Thierry De Clemensat
Member at Jazz Journalists Association
USA correspondent for Paris-Move and ABS magazine
Editor in chief – Bayou Blue Radio, Bayou Blue News
PARIS-MOVE, August 20th 2025
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Musicians:
Eddie Daniels – clarinet, tenor and soprano saxophone
Anthony Wilson – guitar
Josh Nelson – piano
Kevin Axt – bass
Ray Brinker – drums
Kuno Schmid & Josh Nelson – arrangements
Lyris String Quartet – Alyssa Park & Shalini Vijayan, violin, Luke Maurer, viola, Timothy Loo, cello
Trackinglist:
Travessia
Vera Cruz
Tres Pontas
Outubro
Courage
Rio Vermelho
Gira Girou
Morro Velho
Cantavento
Cancao Do Sal
For Milton