Violinist Ricardo Ochoa's Acoustic Office to record live album at District Live, July 2

Acoustic Office is the latest project of Ricardo Ochoa, virtuoso violinist of the Savannah Philharmonic and the popular Gypsy jazz outfit, Velvet Caravan (who are currently on indefinite hiatus). Acoustic Office made their sold-out live debut at Tybee Post Theater earlier this year, and now the band are stepping onto the District Live stage for what promises to be a unique and enlightening concert experience.

Since introducing Acoustic Office to audiences in January, the band have been writing new and original material. For their District Live show, Acoustic Office plan to record the event for a future live album.

“The experience is going to be different and it’s a different type of show,” explained Ochoa. “We might actually even repeat a couple songs just for the sake of the recording. In this case, we really want the audience to be an important part of the experience, and the experience is the recording itself, not necessarily the show. It’s almost going to be like people are hanging out at a recording studio, having cocktails and enjoying the band working on a recording.”

“We are premiering three songs that day, but we’ve written six or seven new songs. We’re also arranging different things and making them really sexy.”

Global music with American sensibilities

Acoustic Office’s core members includes Grammy-nominated Israeli pianist Assaf Gleizner, an Off-Broadway composer who recently moved to Savannah from New York City, as well as Grammy-award winning bassist Marc Chesanow, who has played with many of Savannah’s finest artists and bands including The Eric Jones Trio.

Drummer Uri Zelig is a recent addition (in lieu of guitarist Travis Pullman), who brings a new element to the band’s talented line-up.

“He’s been working with Assaf for a long time,” Ochoa said of Zelig. “He actually went to high school with him in Israel, so they’ve known each other since childhood. He’s worked with Assaf in New York City quite a bit and he did the Off-Broadway shows that Assaf composed.”

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“I felt like in the Tybee show it was necessary to have a guitarist because I really needed to talk about Gypsy jazz and my history with Gypsy jazz, so guitar was an important component to it. Now that Acoustic Office is evolving to different things, we saw that the repertoire that we were proposing for this concert didn’t require a guitar, but it did require drums. That’s the beauty of the concept and experience. What is suitable for the music we want to present will dictate the orchestration and musicians. We’re hoping to have more concerts like this, and the next time might have twelve people on stage, maybe a string section or brass section. It’s very openminded.”

As an instrumental quartet, Acoustic Office fuse global music with an American sensibility, drawing from jazz, classical, tango, and world music. Fans of Velvet Caravan will be anxious to know if Ochoa is swinging some Gypsy jazz, as well.

“I’m going to play a very tradition Gypsy tune because I cannot get way from it,” said Ochoa. “I love Gypsy music and there is always Gypsy on my mind. The Velvet Caravan feel we’re not doing that, but at the same time, it’s a part of me.”

Another style of music that is important to Ochoa is tango, so naturally Acoustic Office will be performing a piece by famed Argentinian composer Astor Piazzola. Ochoa grew up in Venezuela and tango has been a part of his life since childhood.

“That’s another thing that is in my DNA,” said Ochoa.

One of Ochoa’s uncles was a singer and an expert on tango music. When The Ochoa family would have gatherings, while most of the family would be talking in one room or dancing in another, Ochoa’s uncle would be sequestered by himself in the kitchen telling stories and singing songs.

“He would be sitting with my father, my father would be playing guitar, and it was just the two of them,” recalled Ochoa. “I would often sit down with them and listen, and it was an amazing experience for me as a kid to hear these things.”

“I love tangos and the way Piazzola interprets that music. Tango players will say Piazzola is not tangos because it’s not the traditional style, and they’re right. Piazzola, even though he is Argentinian and plays tango, his compositions are more complex—a combination of classical and jazz music. I love him because it is how I see myself interpreting music—combining my own life experience into a piece of music.”

For recording a live album and concert video, District Live was one of the best locations for Acoustic Office to perform.

“They have the perfect staff to do that type of event,” said Ochoa. “They’re really well put together there. Everyone working there is really creative and eager to do stuff well. I think they’re going to be a really important venue for Savannah.”

The seated event should also be an interesting experience for the audience, with unique insight into what goes into a live album recording and how that differs from a regular concert.

“We’re trying to make it as dynamic and exciting as possible as a show, but it is going to be about recording,” said Ochoa. “The difference for musicians is you go on stage and you have fun and communicate with an audience. Magic happens because you’ve got the adrenalin rush, you get the response from the audience. That is really difficult to capture on a recording.

“Musicians also go into a studio and record their music for a record, but that whole process is very sterile because there is no audience and you’re trying to recreate the greatness of the music with no audience. And it happens very often that the recording sounds very different from a live concert, so we’re trying to do with this show is to break that and incorporate both emotions. We want an audience there and make sure they’re feeling it.”

If You Go >>

What: Acoustic Office

When: 5:30 p.m., July 2

Where: District Live, 400 W. River St.

Cost: $25

Info: plantriverside.com

This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Ricardo Ochoa's Acoustic Office to record album at District Live, July 2