The Gil Evans Project was born out of composer/producer Ryan Truesdell’s desire to restore and perform Gil Evans’ music directly from Gil’s original manuscripts. For decades, the only way to perform Gil Evans’ music was through transcriptions, which are often inaccurate, creating a misrepresentation of Gil’s music. The magic of Gil’s writing lies in the details – his use of harmony, very specific instrumentation, his highly unique approach to orchestration, and a very detailed rhythmic and notational structure. Without Gil’s original scores, it is nearly impossible to achieve the accuracy of these elements and perform this music as he originally intended.

After years of painstaking research, countless hours of preparation, and with full support from the Evans family, Ryan Truesdell and the Gil Evans Project have made it possible, for the first time, to perform Gil’s music in its purest form, directly from his manuscripts. Although Truesdell’s original intention was merely to restore the manuscripts of Gil’s known discography, his research led him to the exciting discovery of over fifty new, never-before-heard Evans compositions and arrangements dating from the 1940s through the 1980s. In celebration of Gil’s 100th birthday on May 13, 2012, Truesdell recorded ten of these works which were released on the album, CENTENNIAL: Newly Discovered Works of Gil Evans.