New Life

(2-CD set) When guitarist Peter Leitch heard the diagnosis of stage 4 lung cancer in 2012, and the grim prognosis of 11 months to live, he made the hard choice of undergoing potentially career-ending treatment rather than succumb to the disease. Eight years later, thanks to his indomitable spirit and a brilliant oncologist, he is still live-unable to play his instrument but still driven to create music. Peter has re-invented himself as a composer, arranger, and director of a 14-piece orchestra. Celebrating this transformation, he has released New Life, the Peter Leitch New Life Orchestra's debut recording, Jazz House 7006/7. "After coming to terms with the loss of the use of my left arm as the result of the chemo and radiation," Peter says, "It occurred to me that I was free from the tyranny of the jazz guitar-of having to practice every day. I realized I could create music that was not limited to four fingers on six strings. I began to write." Over the next two years, Peter composed, arranged, and orchestrated the 17 pieces that comprise this two-CD set. Encouraged by his friends and the success of a series of jazz club performances, the band went into the studio! Listeners will find a distillation of "all the music I've ever heard-from hard bop to rural blues to more modern abstract elements."