I was fortunate enough to see Olivia Murphy’s Orchestra at Cheltenham Festival last year performing Siren Cycle (review here) and most of the musicians on stage then have made it to this recording from a few months later. The ability she showed at Cheltenham for the imaginative use of the orchestra as a multi-headed, yet single voiced beast flows through the music on display here. There may be asides and winding threads whilst one musician holds the centre spot but there is a driving coherence to much of this as Murphy develops layers of themes and melodies. I don’t think I’ve been so excited by an orchestral jazz album since I first heard Colin Towns and, like Towns on his Mask Symphonic album Dreaming Man With Blue Suede Shoes with Maria Pia De Vito and Norma Winstone, the voices are folded into the sound of the orchestra, or stand in defiant contrast to it; integral, a part, yet not apart.
Murphy, also, constructs her pieces so well. Listening again to indifferent stars you don’t just recognise how she grows the piece but feel it as well. It is an organic, natural growth, each step evolving from the previous one, rather than simply piling one brick on another. She draws, on occasion, from myth, as on calliope and the magpies and honey thieves, as she did with Siren Cycle whilst other works (sister suite) are aural pen portraits of the four sisters in Alcott’s Little Women. She uses the individual voices well on solos and in combination. honey thieves (part 2) brings us, in swift succession, a coruscating guitar solo by Daniel Kemshell, a haunting flute solo from Ruta Sipola and a mighty orchestral close that all fit together perfectly.
The word, murmuration, came to mind when listening to this album as it captures the natural, spectacular sweep and flow of Murphy’s avian themed music and carries with it an image of her conjuring up movement and changes of direction as if she were conducting a flock of starlings, most strongly evident in turtle dove and a grey- coated sand bird, two parts of her sister suite.
This is such a strong and powerful piece of work that entertains as much as it impresses, so much so, that I may break with tradition and go out and accost a member of the younger generation who can assist me in downloading the rest of her music from Bandcamp. Dave Sayer
And, to close, an additional note from my confederate, Steve, who was also hugely impressed at last year’s Cheltenham performance. Steve said of fateful birds…..:-I'm playing it again. I'm trying to be balanced and not overly gushing, but I think it's fantastic. Usually, for instance when 'voices' are used in the manner she uses them, I shrink into a ball of horror. Amongst other things, there's a great Hiram Bullock like guitar solo, big ensemble sections, it swings in all the right places with endless invention at every juncture. I got to see some of her scores online and couldn't make head nor tail of them (and I can read music!), so wonder what it’s like to be inside her head... is it all confusion or does she hear this stuff all the time. I'm not skilled enough to know her influences, but I hear Carla Bley and especially Gil Evans (who I loved, as you know). She's very young so it’s quite exciting. I hope she earns enough to keep going. She'll have to improve her business acumen though. It was lovely to have a handwritten card from her, and she clearly also packaged and posted it herself. Alas, this also suggests she ain't selling too many!* Anyway, I'm rooting for her. Steve Woodhull
*This may change after the 4* review in last month’s Jazzwise.
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