Troy's Days

Troy's Days

Bruce Von Stiers

Troy Roberts is a saxophonist who has played with Dave Grusin, Van Morrison and Sarah McKenzie. He has played on and off for a long time with Joey DeFrancesco. As a band leader, Troy has recorded several albums, including Secret Rhyme, Soul Garbage and Tales & Tones.

This year finds Tony with a brand new album out. This one is titled Days Like These. It has a mix of standards and original compositions.

The album is being released by Vandoren and Tony's own label, Toy Robot Music. It has eight songs and a play time of almost an hour and fifteen minutes. The album was produced by Tony and engineered by Tom Tedesco at his Tedesco Studios.

On the album, Tony plays the tenor saxophone. He is joined by Jeff “Tain” Watts on drums and Joey DeFrancesco and Emmet Cohen on organ. Emmet is the producer and pianist on the acclaimed “Masters Legacy Series.” “Tain” has played in the band for the Tonight Show with Jay Leno and played and recorded with the Branford Marsalis Quartet. Joey has played with Arturo Sandoval and James Moody among other greats along with leading his own group and recording a whole bunch of albums. Joey plays the organ on the first three songs on the album and Emmet plays on the remaining songs.

I come across some very interesting things while researching for my reviews. Especially when it comes to music reviews. I was researching the background for the song, My Girl Is Just Woman Enough For Me. The song was written by Albert Hague, who not only composed some great music, but also acted in films such as Fame , along with the later same television show and also coached such actors as Jane Fonda and Robert Redford. This song has been recorded my many artists over the years, including on at least two albums by Stanley Turrentine. Troy does a fantastic job with his rendition of the song. There is a killer drum solo in the song.

Why Was I Born is a Jerome Kern song that was written for the stage production of Sweet Adeline. Vocalists from Lena Horne to Cher have recorded it along with musicians such as Sonny Rollins. Subtle sax that at times is almost sad sounding is at the forefront of the song. The drum and organ music do a nice job of backing the sax.

Trams is an original composition whose intro gives Troy a chance to show off some solo skills on the sax. Moving forward into the song the drums bring out a good companion to the sax and the organ slides in with a nice balance. There is an especially cool organ bit about a quarter of the way through the song.

With the lightness of a gentle breeze, Troy's sax is great on the song The Waltz of Parting Ways.

I saw the song title, Sly Old Dog, and wondered just what kind of song it would be. I found that it was at times a moderate paced tune and at others times fairly fast. It was an interesting tune with some pretty cool organ music.

Jack The Sipper is a slight toe tapper.

Little Man You've Had A Busy Day has been recorded by Perry Como, Count Basie and even Eric Clapton. Troy and the others provide a pretty decent rendition of this classic tune.

The album closes with Wizard of Ozroop. It is a fairly fast paced original composition. The song features some great sax from Troy.

Days Like These is a really good album. Troy's original compositions combined with some standards that aren't often found on current releases, make for a great mix.

Days Like These is available now. IF you'd like more information, visit Troy Roberts' official web site at https://troyroberts.com/

Back to the BVS Reviews Main Menu

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________