New York City saxophonist and composer Alison Shearer releases a coming-of-age musical testament with her sophomore studio album, In The Garden (Pinch Records), set for release on Friday, October 10, 2025. The rising star jazz saxophonist dwells In The Garden of sound and self to discover what's been waiting to be unearthed. A recording she embarked on with engineer and Pinch Records label owner Scott Lindner, In The Garden is a gift, following Shearer's years of honing her singular voice and emerging as a leading female jazz artist.
Whereas Alison Shearer's debut album, View From Above (NPR Music "Top 10 Albums of 2022" – Nikki Birch), was a tribute to her late father the legendary civil rights-era photojournalist John Shearer, In The Garden finds Alison composing several years after her father's battle with prostate cancer (he died on June 22, 2019) and feeling as though she's finally found her sound. "Artists compose music to help people access their emotions through sound, like no other medium can," Shearer says. "Writing allows me to understand who I am, and at 36, I'm finally living the life I've wanted and I'm ready to speak out and tell my story so other women in music can hopefully have a journey that's a little bit easier."
In The Garden centers around Alison's working band featuring Kevin Bernstein (piano, Fender Rhodes, synthesizers), Marty Kenney (bass), and Horace Phillips (drums). Shearer is able to exhibit a pop sensibility within a complex rhythmic thicket; she likes to describe the album as a "collection of odd meter earworms." "Homer," inspired by drum maestro Nate Smith, marks the first single (Release Date: August 1, 2025) and is the hardest-hitting tune on In The Garden. Alison's performance is dialed in and hot.
"Sophie's World" (Release Date: August 29, 2025) comes from the title of a book on philosophy by Jostein Gaarder. The contemplative vibe is set by Bernstein's starry Wurlitzer and Kenney's gently rotating bass line. The rhythmic changes are subtly blended into each other, imperceptible to all but the most careful listeners.
"Liberty Market" (Release Date: Friday, September 26, 2025) gets its name from a marketplace in Lahore, Pakistan that Shearer visited while on tour with Sunny Jain's Wild Wild East in 2022. Shearer captures the vibrancy, the children running around, the multitude of colors and sounds, through soprano saxophone and flute melodies that weave effortlessly in and out of a multi-metric setting. Like the whole album, this track was cut live to tape and you can feel it in its jubilation. "Skylark" is the sole standard on In the Garden; one of Alison's favorite tunes. The 7/8 feel and piano ostinato makes this rendition her own.
The most straight-ahead track on the album is "But Not For Now." Featuring Kevin Bernstein (piano) and Marty Kenney (acoustic bass), Shearer continues to surprise us with an interlude/outro written in a baroque style. The soulful title track "In The Garden", ends with an alto solo that gives an exuberant Kenny Garrett like energy. Alison says, "The whole idea of being in the garden, is being ready to bloom." "Treehouse," an uptempo bembe tune, is the first flute tune she's written for her quartet - Willie Colon fans will be happy with this one. "Treehouse" segues into the joyful "Remember When," with soaring solos by Bernstein and Shearer, and a tight drum/sax duo moment between Phillips and Shearer.
About Alison Shearer
Saxophonist Alison Shearer is the daughter of legendary civil rights-era photojournalist John Shearer, who was one of the youngest and second black staff photographer for LIFE magazine. He chronicled the funerals of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., as well as Muhammad Ali before his infamous fight with Joe Frazier. Her grandfather was the illustrator Ted Shearer, who released the first nationally syndicated cartoon featuring a black character, Quincy. The Shearer family accomplished an array of firsts in the black community, and lived among other greats such as Cab Calloway and Sidney Poitier in Greenburgh, NY. While she grew up with a pedigree of black excellence, Alison's sense of racial identity was complicated due to the fairness of her skin. She has always been tremendously proud of her black heritage and identifies as a mixed-race woman, but she grew up being perceived as white, living in a predominantly white neighborhood within Westchester County.
The drive of her family was certainly passed down to her, and at 17, she enrolled at the prestigious Manhattan School of Music. Tragically, her time at school was tarnished by severe sexual trauma, which would have a lasting impact on her life and relationship to jazz and music in general. Without naming names, Alison no longer remains silent about her experience and is certainly not the only woman who went through similar trials at elite schools. In spite of this, Alison persevered and has built a tremendous career: she tours internationally as a member of Red Baraat and Sunny's Jain Wild Wild East, is on the faculty of Jazz at Lincoln Center's High School Jazz Academy and has become an established composer. She received chamber commissions from USCB Center for the Arts in 2024 and 2025, as well as a commission to write a saxophone concerto from ROCO in Houston, Texas, which will premiere in September 2026.
Alison's return to the studio for In The Garden is a milestone presenting a deeply personal project that charts a terrain of grief, resilience, and rebirth. Much more than a collection of compositions, In The Garden is a sonic memoir. It is Shearer's reckoning with the complexity of life and lineage, told through music that is as technically masterful as it is emotive. In The Garden spotlights her as a rising force in jazz with something powerful to say.
To view Alison Shearer's forthcoming tour dates, please visit: alisonshearermusic.com
