DENKI by JC Sanford's EQ (Electric Quartet)

A few years ago as Covid was beginning to wane, I started messing with some guitar pedals while playing locally with my friends Andrea and Brady. I eventually brought a couple effects to a gig to experiment in a live situation, and my friends were like, “You should do more of that!” So I started to venture down the rabbit hole of effects/pedals/electronics as a new branch of my musical personality. It was quite a revelation for me suddenly having all these new soundscapes available, but I’ve always been conscious about the results not being a gimmick, but an enhancement of my language and timbre.

The band name EQ seemed obvious as an abbreviation for “Electric Quartet,” but also sort of tongue-and-cheek symbolizes the amount of sound equalization that has needed to be stepped up for this group. The title of the record DENKI appropriately means “electricity” in Japanese (something I’m using a lot more of these days), but is also a tribute to my mentor Bob Brookmeyer’s transformational 1994 album of the same name (Electricity).


"ausgleicht" is German word for equalized, and it represents the dual character of this tune while also referencing the EQ band title. We balance a melodic 12/8 romp with rocking out like a German metal band.

I wanted to write a slow jam that featured my drummer, friend, and musical guru Satoshi Takeishi. I and so many musicians around the world admire him for his solidity and years of musical intelligence, emotion, and dedication he brings to every situation. Some of the characters in his Japanese name represent the ideas of “stone” and “wisdom,” so "The Wise Stone" seemed like a fitting title describing how I feel about him as a drummer and person.

A sort of palette cleanser after those first two intense tracks, "Purple Spring" is intended to have a pastoral feel to it and refers to the many purple flowers that crop up in our yard at the first signs of spring.

"Futari" simply means “two people”in Japanese, and I thought it fit for this improvised duo.

"Boku to Kare wa" is a fragment of a Japanese phrase basically meaning “me and him.” What could follow in the statement is boundless.

The title to "Head Rare, Red Hair" emerged when I was playing a little game I do with my daughter when I reverse the first letters of a two-word grouping. What I found out when I reversed “red hair” to “hed rair”, was that that is actually sort of a statement on its own, given how uncommon it is for people to have red hair in this world (less than 2%). Eat your heart out, Will Shortz!

One way this group gelled right away when we added Satoshi into the mix was through open improvisation. "And So It Begins" was a particularly impassioned bit of communication and was the first thing we tracked together in the studio.

My friend and great composer Scott Miller attended one of EQ’s early gigs and was immediately captivated by our sound and concept. He asked if he could write something for us, and I enthusiastically agreed. "That 60s Heist Movie" is the first of many more to come, and we had a ton of fun putting our stamp on it.

I saw Stevie Wonder live with my family in late October 2024. The tour was called: "Sing Your Song! As We Fix Our Nation's Broken Heart," and it was a call to love each other as we move forward in our incredibly divisive world. The resulting election clearly didn’t work out the way he and many of us had hoped, but I felt it was my sacred duty to try to carry on his message the best I could. So I wanted to create a version of his "Love’s in Need of Love Today" to suggest the pensiveness of our current time and the tumultuous questions we have about our future.

Trombonist/composer/conductor JC Sanford has had his works performed by Danilo Pérez, Dave Liebman, John Abercrombie, Ingrid Jensen, and others. He is regularly recognized as a "Rising Star Trombonist" in DownBeat Magazine's Critic's Poll. As a conductor, he is a member of the thrice-Grammy-nominated John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble, John Ellis' Ice Siren, and the Alice Coltrane Orchestra.

jcsanford.com