One

"A solo guitar album basking in the riches of Kreisberg's expression" -- DOWNBEAT

1. Canto de Ossanha - 5:11
2. Summertime - 6:02
3. Without Shadow - 1:22
4. Skylark - 5:23
5. Caravan - 5:05
6. Tenderly - 2:02
7. My Favorite Things - 4:05
8. Hallelujah - 5:27
9. E.S.P. - 4:17
10. I Thought About You - 4:42
11. Escape From Lower Formant Shift - 2:34

Jonathan Kreisberg- Solo Guitar

A solo performance represents the most intimate communion between an artist and their instrument. The title of guitarist Jonathan Kreisberg's first solo album, ONE, succinctly expresses that idea. "I've played in many group situations and with some legends of jazz and other idioms... but it wasn't until now that I really felt ready to document what I've been doing in a solo setting. For that, I had to feel at one with the guitar."

While most of his time is spent on tour with his dynamic Jonathan Kreisberg Quartet and alongside Hammond B3 organ legend Dr. Lonnie Smith, in a far more intimate setting he began noticing an entirely different alchemy. The idea for this recording came to Kreisberg upon the realization that his playing reached a uniquely expressive level when playing solo in more intimate concert environments, or even casually at home for friends.

"There's something about connecting with just one or two people who are really listening to you in a solo setting that's totally different than playing for an audience," Kreisberg says. "It's a more intense connection, and it brings a different energy. I wanted to try to capture that feeling. I didn't want it to sound like you were in a huge hall in front of hundreds of people. I wanted it to sound like you were sitting in front of me, like you could hear the strings and the pick and my breathing - all of the life of the guitar."

To achieve that effect, Kreisberg recorded ONE without using overdubs, loops, or extra tracks. "The music making establishment uses so much technology these days that the idea of the instrumentalist is becoming marginalized," he says. "On the purest level, I wanted this to be an instrumentalist's record."

The end result is a collection that offers a wide-ranging overview of Kreisberg's approach to the solo guitar, diverse in style and feel but emotionally cohesive. From the overcast passion of Baden Powell's "Canto de Ossanha" to the silky acoustic elegance of "Skylark," the fragile spirituality of "Hallelujah" to the sci-fi abstractions of "Escape From Lower Formant Shift" - each piece offers a new perspective while maintaining a profound intimacy, and proving that it only takes a singular voice to unite a wildly diverse sonic palette. "There's a way to have very varied material, but if it all goes through one particular creative person's prism it can be refracted in a way that it all becomes part of the same vision."