Watch: Becca Stevens & Alan Hampton

The New York Times provides a perceptive description of the music of Alan Hampton: “emotional and precise…love songs fascinated by craft, with acoustic guitars, deep changes of rhythm and key, and soft, spacious arrangements.” They also offer a succinct yet incisive summary of Becca Stevens' work: "impressively absorbing".We'll be presenting the inaugural collaboration between Becca and Alan as part of our ongoing collaboration with Symphony Space, The Jazz Gallery Uptown, this Thursday, January 26th at 7:30pm.Under 30? $15 tickets are still available! Get yours here.Featuring Becca and Alan at Symphony Space was an idea that surfaced when Jazz Gallery Programming Director Rio Sakairi and Executive Director Debbie Steinglass met with Symphony Space Artistic Director Laura Kaminsky about possible collaborations. Rio speaks:

Often I have a hard time explaining the thought process behind my curatorial decisions. I have a sense of what will work and what won't. When I put together a band for The Jazz Gallery's Holiday Party last December, I called upon Miguel Zenon, Vijay Iyer, Fima Ephron, and Nate Smith. I knew that would work great, and that I would have an amazing time listening to them working it out, but they were skeptical. Afterwards, Vijay said to me, "I guess you know something I don't." Miguel was pleasantly surprised by how easily things came together and how much fun he had. The same principle and sort-of-a-thought-process apply here. I know that, although they have never collaborated before, Becca and Alan are a great match and I'll enjoy their music immensely.

I dropped by Alan's place in Windsor Terrace recently to snap some photos of these two rehearsing (above), and managed to capture some video footage of an in-progress arrangement of one of Alan's songs:The Jazz Gallery Uptown: Becca Stevens & Alan Hampton from Jazz Gallery on Vimeo..