The Microscopic Septet at Smalls Jazz Club

Active for a dozen years, the Microscopic Septet were widely recognized as "New York's Most Famous Unknown Band." The group started with a basic reeds-and-rhythm texture (soprano, alto, tenor and baritone sax, piano, bass and drums) that was sonically similar to the sound of the Swing Era. However, they employed these textures to address a widely eclectic range of styles, from free-form music to R&B, rhumbas and ragtime.

The result was a brilliant blend of fresh-sounding orchestration and inspired soloing. Beloved in New York, where they generally drew capacity crowds, "The Micros" were one of the most celebrated of the many cutting-edge units associated with experimental music's best-known venue, the Knitting Factory, during the peak years of the "Downtown" music movement in the mid 1980s onward. ...

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Active for a dozen years, the Microscopic Septet were widely recognized as "New York's Most Famous Unknown Band." The group started with a basic reeds-and-rhythm texture (soprano, alto, tenor and baritone sax, piano, bass and drums) that was sonically similar to the sound of the Swing Era. However, they employed these textures to address a widely eclectic range of styles, from free-form music to R&B, rhumbas and ragtime.

The result was a brilliant blend of fresh-sounding orchestration and inspired soloing. Beloved in New York, where they generally drew capacity crowds, "The Micros" were one of the most celebrated of the many cutting-edge units associated with experimental music's best-known venue, the Knitting Factory, during the peak years of the "Downtown" music movement in the mid 1980s onward.

Beginning in 2006, the Micros came back together again, sparked by a re-release of their 1980s LPs on a series of CDs on Cuneiform, eventually releasing a series of highly regarded CD, also on Cuneiform, featuring both new and earlier, unrecorded Micros music.

Beginning with Lobster Leaps In and followed by Friday The 13th: The Micros Play Monk, Manhattan Moonrise and Been Up So Long It Looks Like Down to Me: The Micros Play the Blues, the Micros began playing once or twice a year in New York, despite the fact that the two band-leaders, Phillip Johnston lives in Sydney, Australia, and Joel Forrester in Lyons, France, until the pandemic made travel impossible. . . until now.

In July 2022, for the first time since the 2017 concert ‘Forever Weird’ at The Kitchen (with generational fellow travelers Jazz Passengers & Kamikaze Ground Crew), the Micros are gathering in New York to play two gigs, at Jazz Forum and Smalls Jazz Club. Don’t miss this extremely rare opportunity and, more importantly, good time.

"The Micros skip merrily through the century, finding an avant-garde side street branching off from a trad-jazz Main Street.... As always with the Micros, it's gloriously, delightfully and inappropriately right. Welcome back." (four stars) – Downbeat

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