© 2024 Connecticut Public

FCC Public Inspection Files:
WEDH · WEDN · WEDW · WEDY · WNPR
WPKT · WRLI-FM · WEDW-FM · Public Files Contact
ATSC 3.0 FAQ
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Owen McNally writes about jazz and other music events in Connecticut's Jazz Corridor, stretching from the tip of Fairfield County, right through New Haven and Hartford, and on up beyond the state into the Pioneer Valley of Massachusetts. Keep up with the best our area has to offer in music.

Saxophonist Serves Cutting-Edge Jazz and Savory Slices of Pizza at His Wilton Pizzeria

Matt Criscuolo
Matt Criscuolo on the alto saxophone
A Bronx native and longtime Connecticut resident, Criscuolo fell madly in love with jazz at an early age.

As you approach Matt Criscuolo’s Wilton Pizza nestled on the Wilton Town Green, be prepared to be enveloped by, perhaps even enraptured by, a savory, swinging, shrine-like, aromatic ambience celebrating the nourishing power and the delicious glory of both jazz and pizza.

If you’re lucky, Criscuolo, a cordon bleu free jazz alto saxophonist/composer, chef, restaurateur, and entrepreneur, just might be out on his patio on a Friday summer’s evening, wailing away with his quartet, which features the brilliant virtuoso guitarist/composer Tony Purrone.

By the time you get within 30 feet or so of Criscuolo’s ultra-hip pizzeria on a day when there’s no live jazz, you’ll be greeted by the recorded sounds of such immortals as Charlie Parker or John Coltrane.    

Inside, the welcoming eatery’s walls are reverentially lined with black-and-white photos of such jazz saints as Dizzy Gillespie, Chet Baker, Miles Davis, and other hallowed members of the owner’s jazz pantheon. 

Even the menus are illustrated, holy picture fashion, with images of jazz deities revered by the musician/restaurateur, who is every bit as deeply committed to creating high quality jazz as he is to cooking classy cuisine.

Credit Matt Criscuolo
Outdoor seating at Wilton Pizza and Pasta

A Bronx native and longtime Connecticut resident, Criscuolo fell madly in love with jazz at an early age after showing a precocious gift as a classical piano student.

Later, as a teenager hooked on jazz, he worked for his father, an Italian immigrant, in the Criscuolo family’s popular pizzeria in Rowayton, an affluent Connecticut coastal village just 40 miles from New York City.  

Credit Matt Criscuolo
Jazz guitarist Tony Purrone, left, with Criscuolo, right.

  As an apprentice member of his restaurateur father’s kitchen cabinet at Rowayton Pizza, young Matt learned the art and the craft of the restaurant business from the workings and mysteries of the pizza oven to the mastering of ancient, secret family recipes traced all the way back to Italy. Over the years, Criscuolo, a first-generation Italian-American, who is fluent in Italian, has visited Italy numerous times and still has family there.

Once your senses are whetted by the sounds and aromas in the air and the images on the walls and menus at Wilton Pizza, you can order such Criscuolo specials as Ravioli Coltrane (pronounced in a faux-Italianate manner by some patrons as Ravioli COLE-TRAH-NAY); Linguine Miles Davis or, if you prefer holiday fare, even Lady Day Bolognese.

“Since 1993, I’ve owned a jazz-themed restaurant featuring jazz groups playing here. So, in a small way, I’m doing my share to keep the music alive and to bring it to the community,” Criscuolo says by phone, taking a break from his two full-time professional pursuits, jazz and pizza, double “z” words he has been doubly passionate about for years.

As a fourth-grader, he fell head-over-heels in love with the alto when he heard it played by a professional musician at a school assembly.

“It looked and sounded so cool to me with its tone and shape, and the way the guy was leaning way back when he was playing it,” he recalls.

"At some point you have to dig in your heels and be aware of what your own personal expression is, and bring that out.”
Matt Criscuolo

Credit Matt Criscuolo
Criscuolo, left, on saxophone

  When his father discovered Criscuolo’s crush on alto, he went out and bought him a batch of 8-track tapes featuring the internationally popular Italian alto saxophonist Fausto Papetti (1923-1999). A savvy, sweet-toned, commercially successful saxophonist, Papetti was renowned for his romantic covers of pop hits, as well as for his hot album covers festooned with scantily clad, gorgeous women, an evidently sure-fire combination of saxy flash and sexy flesh that helped sell his recordings around the world by the boatload.

On his own, Criscuolo progressed from maestro Papetti to David Sanborn to Bird, Eric Dolphy, John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman, plus an array of other bold explorers, including Arthur Blythe and Henry Threadgill. He attended Manhattan School of Music and toured Europe, with a long stint in Norway where he became relatively fluent in Norwegian. Closer to home, he's  played throughout the Tri-State area, including his popular Friday night gigs through the summer at his Wilton pizza palace where jazz reigns supreme. 

A one-man pizza/jazz enterprise, he also owns a second pizzeria, Toozy Patza Pizza in Wilton, and, until recently, had also owned two other Connecticut restaurants.    

Versatile and eclectic, he’s played with stylists ranging from the noted avant-gardist David Murray to modern mainstream master, trombonist Steve Davis.     

Right now, he’s in a celebratory mood with the release of his new album, The Dialogue, his seventh CD as a leader. It’s the follow-up to his album, Headin’ Out, which was awarded a much coveted 4 ½ star review by DownBeat magazine.

Both albums unite Criscuolo with his simpatico sidekick/collaborator, Tony Purrone in a synergistic, Damon and Pythias jazz alliance, and are released by the saxophonist’s Jazzeria Records. Criscuolo, who’s also verbally inventive, cooked-up and, he adds, patented the portmanteau word jazzeria.       

A continuously evolving artist with a voice all his own, he’s absorbed the teachings of a ferociously fearless legion of saxophonists ranging alphabetically from Albert Ayler to David S. Ware.

“We all somewhat emulate other great artists. But at some point,” he stresses, “you have to dig in your heels and be aware of what your own personal expression is, and bring that out.”

With his affecting tone and fluent, adventurous phrasing, he explores free, or avant-garde jazz. It’s his way, he explains, “to be open to all possibilities.”    

  As with his use of the best ingredients for his thin crust, crispy pizzas, he believes a catalytic conversational approach to improvisation is the best possible sauce and seasoning for his creativity.    

Credit Matt Criscuolo
Inside Criscuolo's Wilton Pizza and Pasta

“I love to direct my attention to each and every instrumentalist in the band, and if, for example, I hear a strong statement from the drummer, I like to grab on to that and develop the idea,” he says of his basic recipe for jazz success.

“Themes begin to develop and that’s where the music starts to get off at the exit and go off onto the side roads. And then at some point, we get back onto the highway again. It’s like empathetic improv actors reacting to what is being said. It’s a conversation. It just happens.”    

Please submit press releases at least two weeks before publication date to omac28@gmail.com. Comments welcome.

Owen McNally writes the weekly Jazz Corridor column for WNPR.org as well as periodic freelance pieces for The Hartford Courant and other publications.

Stand up for civility

This news story is funded in large part by Connecticut Public’s Members — listeners, viewers, and readers like you who value fact-based journalism and trustworthy information.

We hope their support inspires you to donate so that we can continue telling stories that inform, educate, and inspire you and your neighbors. As a community-supported public media service, Connecticut Public has relied on donor support for more than 50 years.

Your donation today will allow us to continue this work on your behalf. Give today at any amount and join the 50,000 members who are building a better—and more civil—Connecticut to live, work, and play.

Related Content