What
I Heard For Free
(By Ann Alex/Photos courtesy of Ken Drew).
I arrived at the Jazz Cafe on Saturday afternoon to catch the end of
the performance by Lindsay Hannon and
Bradley Johnston, (guitar), part of the Take Five, featuring 5 pairs of musicians. I couldn’t believe I was
listening to Lindsay, as she was singing a tender love song in a sweetly
changed voice, showing great versatility, as with the next song also. Yet
another jazz singer showing further development of her art. Then a complete
contrast – Graham Hardy and Neil
Harland, began with an ambient piece on trumpet and bass guitar, slow,
serene, cinematic, with a drone, entitled Improvisation
In B Flat .I had the strange experience of not being able to see these 2
musicians as I was in an alcove, which concentrates the mind wonderfully.
Next came a contrast, a lively piece, then a
boppy number. The next tune involved bubbly, sucking sounds from the bass (I
think) with brief trumpet comments, but it may have involved electronics, I
couldn’t see. Mish Mash had an
improvised feel, with additions of some banging from the bar which happened to
be in rhythm. The instruments blended, then became wild, with bass chords
cutting across the trumpet. The whole performance was imaginative and
enjoyable.
Up stepped Faye MacCalman (tenor sax, clarinet) and John Pope (bass), to play
standards, but I didn’t catch many of the titles. They began with a smooth,
easygoing tune with a long bass solo, then a slow strong tune with a Central
European feel, a bowed bass and repeated riffs from the tenor. Monk’s Dream brought an amusing
misunderstanding between the musicians, when Faye continued playing when she
should have stopped for the bass. Then a tune with clarinet, before There’ll Never Be Another You, back to
the sax. The music must have been too relaxing for me, or maybe it was the
drink I’d had, as I felt sleepy and had to leave, so missing the last 2 pairs; Noel Dennis/Dean Stockdale and Raymond Macdonald/Graeme Wilson. My
loss.
Sunday
Music students must sleep on Sunday
afternoons, as there were none of them there for The Tuesday Jam On Sunday, unless they’d been before I arrived at
1.30pm. Plenty of other good musicians were present: the house band of Alan Law (piano); Paul Gowland (alto sax);
Paul Grainger (bass); Russ Morgan (drums); plus Stu Finden (sax); Fiona Finden
(sax, vocals); Dave Weisser (cornet) Jude Murphy (sax, flute) Keith Barrett
(guitar). Fiona treated us to a lovely version of Secret Love, sung to a fast repeated 4-note riff from Stu’s sax;
then came Never Leave and Keith
joining in for No Moon At All. It was
interesting to see Alan on what I’d call the naked piano, no front at all,
listeners can see all the hammers in action, which I found a bit unnerving for
reasons I don’t understand.
Over to the Bridge Hotel, to catch the
last of The Improvisers Workshop, where
they were discussing the nature of such an event which raised all the usual
relevant points, such as how abstract is music compared with art, how many
musicians should be involved, what is composition and improvisation, is it best
to have a guiding format, what influence does politeness have on the music.
Then a piece was played with mixed success, a bit messy, involving voices, saxes,
drums, guitar, bass, keys, something metallic, bird sounds, shakers, clapping,
Morse code bleeps, bells. There followed a frank discussion which assessed the
piece well. The discussions were led by Dr
Graeme Wilson and Professor Raymond MacDonald. A final piece was played, a
much more successful work, many musical elements, fewer instruments playing at
once. Someone from the audience joined in with a spoon striking a glass, before
the saxes wound down and a calm guitar ended the piece. I’d advise everyone to
try free improvisation as an interesting challenge to add to your musical
experiences.
I enjoyed what I heard of this festival
and I’d like to see it repeated next year. Thank you especially to Wes
Stephenson, the Festival Producer.
Ann
Alex.
1 comment :
Well, things had warmed up nicely when Anne left. So, just to quickly fill the gap (from memory) - Noel Dennis/Dean Stockdale played many standards with a lovely sound as a duo and with fine individual solo spots along the way.
I often think it's a shame the pianist has to face away from the audience *and* the other players on stage. But this makes their sense of listening to 'the other player' more sensitive, and I think this was borne out when they played as a duo - perfect timing and wonderful interplay. And more than a touch of composing/arranging on-the-fly too.
Finally Raymond MacDonald/Graeme Wilson filled the last slot. Already the audience had diminished a little (it was close to 5pm anyway)but those who stayed *stayed the whole duration* to witness a fine display of improvisational musicianship. What made this slot even more interesting (for me anyway) were the brief interludes between the pieces when each performer said something about their background.
Their shared background in fact, as they had played and busked in Glasgow together many years ago (too many to mention here) - but this gave an interesting insight into their development and how they are able to think and play in such synchronism and read each others next steps, emphasising my previous comment when Dennis and Stockdale were playing together with superb interplay.
So, five distinctly different duos over five hours. Such high quality music for free, and providing a wonderfully warm atmosphere in the Jazz Cafe on a grey and sometimes wet Saturday afternoon. Ken D
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