The all-women's ensemble
Five Play (the similar name
Fourplay was already taken) is a smaller spin-off group of the
Diva Jazz Orchestra. Drummer
Sherrie Maricle from Buffalo, N.Y., the founder of both bands, was inspired by the Blue Note type groups of the '60s to the extent that she wanted to lead a quintet with a similar mainstream jazz, hard bop style. Founded in the late '90s,
Maricle organized the combo with help from
Diva manager Stanley Kay, conceived as a historical "band within a band" along the lines of what
Bob Crosby,
Cab Calloway,
Benny Goodman,
Duke Ellington,
Count Basie, and
Buddy Rich did. The original lineup included
Maricle, saxophonists
Karolina Strassmayer, and San Francisco native
Laura Dreyer, pianist
Lorraine Desmarais, and bassist
Nicki Parrott. This established an international composition of the quintet and jazz in the modern era, as Strassmeyer came to the U.S. from Austria,
Desmarais hailed from Montreal, Canada, and
Parrott came to
Diva and
Five Play as an emigre from Australia. They recorded
Five Play's debut CD
On the Brink in 1998, playing standards, originals of contemporary peers, and bop favorites. For their second recording, Five Play...Plus,
Maricle replaced the pianist and bassist with Japanese nationals
Tomoko Ohno and Noriko Ueda, respectively. She added Israeli born saxophonist and clarinetist
Anat Cohen, American born trumpeters
Jami Dauber from Chicago, New Yorker Barbara Laronga, and retained
Strassmayer. By 2006, the CD
A Jazzy Way had
Five Play as a backup band to Portuguese vocalist
Maria Anadon minus
Strassmayer,
Dauber and Laronga.
Cohen left to start her solo career,
Dauber was retained, and
Strassmayer headed toward working in Latin jazz bands, while Ann Arbor. MI saxophonist Janelle Reichman was recruited via her ties at the University of Michigan with
Diva pianist and U-M professor Ellen Rowe. They produced the 2008 recording What the World Needs Now, their fourth overall effort for the Arbors label. ~ Michael G. Nastos