Reconnected

The title Reconnected has meaning on more than one level. First, it refers to Sencalar's roots, his connections to the grandfathers he holds so dear. On his mother's side, John Fernando García, who passed away in late December 2020, was a father figure and a mentor. With the title track, "Reconnected," Sencalar honors his paternal grandfather, Bülent Sençalar, a noted qanun (box zither) player in Turkey. In Turkish, Sençalar is Shen-cha-lar, which translates loosely as "gold entertainer/music maker" according to Sencalar's father, Ates Bulent Sencalar. "The name originally came from being curators for dancing at social gatherings. That's why I wanted to incorporate dance elements and tempos in all the pieces, in order to bring out that entertainment aspect of playing jazz."