Welcome to BGI Records. We are a bicoastal company dedicated to releasing jazz  recordings that mirror our musical taste and sensibility. We are a two man operation, Executive Producer Bruce Goldsmith, and Music Director Ben Sher.  Inspired by the great released on CTI Records ( Creed Taylor Inc.) we favor a style of jazz that features great improvisation, but in a musical context that reaches out  to an audience beyond those that are not familiar or not interested in traditional  jazz styles. We strive to created a great blend of accessible music that also has challenging virtuosic improvisation. 

 

Our first three recordings TudoBem, Please Take Me to Brasil, and Tempestade, featured the  writing and playing of Guitarist and Producer Ben Sher in a Brazilian context. These critically acclaimed recordings featured some of the heavyweights of the jazz and Brazilian traditions: Duduka daFonseca, Dennis Irwin, Valtinho Anastacio, along with special guests Kenny Barron, Fred Hersch and the great vocalist Luciana Souza. Blending some of the ‘pop’ influences of Brasil 66, and bossa-nova styles of Antonio Carlos Jobim, and also tapping into some of the lesser known traditions of choro and forro, these recordings succeeded in satisfying a large audience. Please Take Me to Brasil still remains on the playlist of WBGO seventeen years later. 

​

Our latest recording East meets West moves in a different direction: here we juxtapose two great guitarists with completely different sounds and styles: Rowan Robertson, an Englsh rock guitarist formerly with the band Dio brings the post Eddie Van Halen style: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-U4yASjO7A and Ben Sher brings his cool modern bop jazz guitar  style: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNcY3AbfMyo .

 

We’ve chosen some real familiar pop and rock tunes….everyone remember “Spooky”?, and classics by Bob Marley, Crosby Stills and Nash, Blue Oyster Cult and Jeff Beck and given them our own spin.