Colleen Allen Archives

9 Nov 2016

Nick Tateishi: No Audition!

Nick is 25 years old – a former student of our sax player Colleen Allen’s, she recommended him. I went to see him play – hired him on the spot. no audition… We love his playful approach, he wouldn’t just find parts he would “cast” his guitar as a character in a Manteca song. He understood that he didn’t have to play all the time… he could be a tourist in the band and go and see the horns – play a line with them, then come back and hang out with the rhythm section…because we never had guitar before, when we work on “re-invention” he does not have to, because his instrument has a clean slate in the band, so if he decides that he wants to approach something with a country sound or an African Highlife sound by it’s very nature it is new to us. We have a lot of great guitar player friends who had spent the last 37 years telling us the only thing wrong with our band was no guitar player, a problem that miraculously they had the solution to.

Nick Tateishi brought such a positive energy to the creation of this new album…. we’re delighted to have Nick with us.

8 Nov 2016

Dolby Atmos Listening

Mission accomplished! Bravo! Really a remarkable experience thank you everyone! This could not have been done with more precision, more craft, more warmth and kindness and more taste.

L to R

Front row: Jeff Wolpert – Engineer, Matt Zimbel – Manteca/ producer / Composer, Anthony Montuno – Dolby Atmos Mixer, Charlie Cooley – Drummer/Manteca

Second row: Colleen Allen – Sax/Flute/Manteca, Doug Wilde – keyboards/Composer/Manteca, Michael Nunan – Dolby Atmos Mixer, Walter Vanafro – Jazz FM Host

Third row: Ben Escobedo, Justin Auld, Doug Spears. All 3 from Sennheiser (Ben is Sennheiser USA, the other 2 gents from Sennheiser Canada)

Far right: Norman Verrall, HHB Canada representing Merging Technologies

12 Oct 2016

Colleen Allen

This is Colleen Allen she has been playing in Manteca for 7 years now. She plays, and be patient here, this is going to take a while; baritone sax, soprano sax, bass clarinet, alto flute, flute, piccolo, tenor sax, alto sax, accordion and um, that’s it. After saxophonist Kelly Jefferson left the band last year (lawsuits pending – just kidding…we love Kelly and he is also fond of us…) Colleen suggested we replace him with a guitar player! A guitar player! Which we did. And she thereby doubled her load by having to either cover or replace all of Kelly’s parts too! And in a move of exceptional Machiavellian brilliance she was then assured of having every sax solo in the Manteca book! There is now a space on stage known by our crew as “Sax World” or “Saxlandia”, depending which member of the crew you are speaking to. We have been thinking about getting Colleen a “Sax Caddy” as she has so many quick changes to make between instruments. “Ma’am, I’d recommend a Bass Clarinet for this whole note.”

Colleen’s performance on this record is exceptional. Each one of her solos tell a story, a story full of heart, emotion and chops. I remember during what became the keeper take of Illusionist, we were ten feet from each other with a little glass wall separating us for sonic reasons and as she played her solo, I closed my eyes and with every twist and turn she took me on a voyage and when it was done and I knew it was recorded, and I knew it was THE solo, I felt like we had bottled magic. You can see this all unfold on Jean Francois Gratton’s beautiful video at manteca-music.com.

Colleen is the resident artist at Soulpepper Theatre, which is one of the reasons we are doing our launch at the Young Centre for the Performing Arts there on Nov. 10. at 8PM. You got your tickets right? No, oh man you better go get ‘em it’s gonna sell out it’s an intimate place.