"It's unusual that such a wondrous jazz moment gets caught on tape. But that's the story behind the captivating Starlight Café, CD number three by rising star flugelhornist-composer bandleader Dmitri Matheny. Working with his remarkable trio of pianist Darrell Grant and bassist Bill Douglass, Matheny embarks on an exquisite ride through the cosmos, romancing and musing on his horn with balladic delicacy and gorgeous ebullience. This is dimmer-switch and candlelight music, best savored when the lights are low. Rich with improvisation and played to perfection, Starlight Café gleams with rapturous jazz radiance."
~Dan Ouellette, Down Beat
"Starlight Café is a quiet, hauntingly beautiful album of ballads and standards -- late-night jazz that proves you don't need to make a lot of noise to make a strong impression."
~Joel Roberts, All About Jazz
"This is dimmer-switch and candlelight music, best savored when the lights are low. Rich with improvisation and played to perfection, Starlight Café gleams with rapturous jazz radiance."
~Dan Ouellette, Down Beat
""This is music to touch your heart. A twilight mood for lovers of leisurely paced music. Dmitri Matheny's warm pellucid sound truly encapsulates the essence of jazz."
~Marian McPartland, National Public Radio
"One of the ten best jazz CDs of the year: Recorded live in Berkeley, Starlight Café is an exquisite, soft-spoken album of standards and originals, ideal for quiet nights. In the company of bassist Bill Douglass and pianist Darrell Grant, Matheny savors a relaxed, reflective mood through a handful of nocturnes and standards. Matheny's velvety horn glides effortlessly above the sympathetic, sparse accompaniment of Douglass and Grant, weaving a spellbinding tapestry of sounds."
~Wayne Saroyan, Oakland Tribune
"On this, his third CD as a leader, Dmitri Matheny displays the kind of flugelhorn sound that has inspired this Metheny to start spending an extra hour each day in the woodshed.
It's as gorgeous and soulful as a sumptuous full moon on a breezy summer night. And that's not to mention a level of technique and fluidity that will probably end up adding another hour to this admirer's new regimen.
It's also fun to try to spot the influences. Because Starlight Café is mostly an evocative, late night session with drummerless accompaniment, Dmitri's lyrical side is almost always the center of attention.
When it is, Jack Sheldon immediately comes to mind. But there's also a dash of Chet, a little Bobby Shew, and some Tom Harrell. It's an amalgam that makes for a single new and refreshing voice.
The fare on Starlight Café is a straight ahead assortment of originals and recognizable standards ("Corcovado," "Stardust," "When Lights Are Low"), all of which are played with great lyricism and group empathy.
In pianist Darrell Grant and bassist Bill Douglass, Dmitri Matheny has found the perfect backup for this kind of date; after all, playing a whole gig without a drummer takes a special kind of musicianship. This threesome pulls it off brilliantly.
This is excellent music from three very talented artists. And it offers additional proof that, at 33, Dmitri Matheny is clearly poised to become one of the jazz world's next important trumpet/flugelhorn players.
A big thumbs up from this distant cousin in Kansas City."
~ Mike Metheny, Jazz Ambassadors Magazine / Jazz Beat Forum / 52nd Street Jazz
"When I was a kid and knew absolutely nothing about jazz, I was often struck by the melancholy sound of the flugelhorn, usually as background music in films. I searched and searched for a record to fit those melancholy moods, something with that distinctive, sad sound, but all to no avail. And while I discovered a lot of great jazz in the process, I didn't discover that dark, late-night record that would elevate my mood to something filmic.
I've finally found it: Dmitri Matheny's Starlight Café.
This is the album I've spent a lifetime looking for. Playing flugelhorn exclusively -- a first cousin to the trumpet, but with a mellower tone -- Matheny is backed by Darrell Grant on piano and Bill Douglass on bass.
Their sound I can only describe, in the best sense of the word, as pretty. Don't get me wrong: nothing offends my musical sensibilities more than light jazz (or smooth jazz, if you prefer). But this is no light jazz; this is real jazz imbued with an increasingly rare beauty.
Matheny has almost unanimously wowed critics, counting amongst his recent accolades being named one of four Best New Artists in the JazzIz Magazine Readers Poll, and Talent Deserving Wider Recognition in the Down Beat International Critics Poll."
~Stephen Seigel, Tucson Weekly
"Starlight Café is a real winner. Matheny mixes soulful, torchy ballads with inventive uptempo numbers with deft ease."
~Chris DeBenedetti, North Beach Now
"A fine new CD, Starlight Café affirms Matheny's atavistic standing as a romantic and as a brass player who can limn slow motion ballads without referencing Miles."
~Gary Giddins, Village Voice
"Soca Nova," from Matheny's album Starlight Café, invited fours between piano and flugelhorn, as the trio presented the tune via a happy calypso arrangement. Throughout the CD, the leader offered glimpses of his unique style as he employed a personal touch through adaptations such as half-valve growls and playing directly into the piano strings for a faraway sound."
~Jim Santella, Los Angeles Jazz Scene
"It's unusual that such a wondrous jazz moment gets caught on tape. But that's the story behind the captivating Starlight Café, CD number three by rising star flugelhornist-composer bandleader Dmitri Matheny. Working with his remarkable trio of pianist Darrell Grant and bassist Bill Douglass, Matheny embarks on an exquisite ride through the cosmos, romancing and musing on his horn with balladic delicacy and gorgeous ebullience. This is dimmer-switch and candlelight music, best savored when the lights are low. Rich with improvisation and played to perfection, Starlight Café gleams with rapturous jazz radiance."
~Dan Ouellette, Down Beat
"The music on Starlight Café, Matheny's live disc, is splendid—familiar standards such as "Stardust," "When Lights Are Low," Jobim's tropical "Corcovado (Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars)," and a few originals—is lush, seductive and dreamy. The album also continues Matheny's unabashed passions for all things celestial."
~Wayne Saroyan, Contra Costa Times
"Dmitri Matheny's third album, Starlight Café, is a ravishingly beautiful session with bass master Bill Douglass and the superb young pianist Darrell Grant."
~Andrew Gilbert, Contra Costa Times
"Listen to Starlight Café, and it will sound seductively familiar, like you've been listening to his ebony tones and molasses rhythms all your life. These are loose and easy tunes, liquid silky, and yet Matheny' s improvisations—with Darrell Grant on piano and Bill Douglass on bass—still press the limits of standards like "Stardust" and "When You Wish Upon a Star." His third album is an intimate confection imbued with a warm delicacy, mellow lyricism and the lazy elegance..."
~T.D. Mobley-Martinez, Albuquerque Tribune
"Starlight Café is a quiet, hauntingly beautiful album of ballads and standards -- late-night jazz that proves you don't need to make a lot of noise to make a strong impression."
~Joel Robert, All About Jazz
"Dmitri Matheny hardly plays an unpretty note on his flugelhorn throughout Starlight Café. Matheny essays ballads and mid-tempo pieces with a winning, natural lyricism...unquestionably a master."
~Steve Futterman, JazzIz
"One of the jazz world’s most talented horn players, he is a rarity in the music world: a rising star free of ego and hubris. Matheny’s mild mannered appearance belies the smoldering passion that oozes from his horn. His recent CD, Starlight Café shows off Matheny’s prodigiously versatile talent and promises that the jazz scene is well-stocked for the future."
~MetroActive
