Newvelle Records has always been about more than the music. The curated artwork and literature are an essential element in the presentation of each Season as a complete work of art.

For Season Four, visual artist (and talented reed player) Hery Paz immersed himself in the music to create a series of large paintings inspired by the music. Each album cover is a fragment of Paz's larger, abstract paintings which appears on the inside gatefold—carefully selected to evoke the music of the album. Originally from Cuba and currently based in Brooklyn, Paz is a multidimensional artist who has created album art for many prominent jazz artists and contributed tenor sax, bass clarinet, and Suono on the Francisco Mela record Ancestros released as part of Newvelle Season Three.

The literature for Season Four was created by celebrated author Tim Sultan. Sultan's last book Sunny's Nights was celebrated as “a perfect, insightful cocktail: full-bodied, multitextured and delicious” by the New York Times, and he is quickly becoming known as one of the pre-eminent chroniclers of New York City life. Exclusive to Newvelle, “Churchill Down” is an original short story that unfolds throughout the season. In it, Sultan weaves together jazz histories and icons through the auto-biographic lens of a fictional jazz musician. A chapter will be released with each album, coming together as the box set is completed. 

An Excerpt from “Churchill Down”:

I think of Dodo Marmarosa from time to time. I miss Phineas Newborn Jr., if one can miss a person one never knew. Gigi Gryce, shouldn’t they name a park, a comet, a butterfly after you? I take a Slim Gaillard in the morning and one in the evening—two if it’s been a hard day. In the overnight, I pass the hours mulling over Churchill McGinnis with the kind of preoccupation one usually reserves for pondering the fate of long-lost aviators. We all have our personal pantheons. Mine, as it happens, favors the overlooked.

– Tim Sultan, Churchill Down, Chapter 1

Tim Sultan