GLASGOW JAZZ FESTIVAL PREVIEW
_ Tailor made
Bobby Watson Bobby Watson is composer-in- residcnce at this year's Festival. although. unlike most of his predecessors in the role, he is not
particularly known for his composition.
His primary reputation is as a highly resourceful saxophonist working in an expanded bop idiom. but his writing has perhaps been under-valued.
it has come into sharper focus with the formation of his Tailor Made big band in New York. and it was that project which tempted the Festival to invite both him and the band. it was a good move logistically, since it incorporates both the 29th Street Saxophone Quartet and his Horizon quintet. both of which will feature separately.
The centrepiece. though. will be the big band concert, which includes the Festival‘s usual commission. with the help of Scottish Arts Council funding. The piece. according to Bobby. will be a suite called ‘Afroisms‘. each section of which will have a catch-phrase drawn from various people he has known over the years as its title.
‘These little sayings are common in the black community. and in a way they operate as metaphors. ways of saying more than you are actually saying. When i write. though. the music comes first and l add the title later. so the sections aren't necessarily musically inspired by their titles.
‘This opportunity came up when l signed to Columbia Records. and we made the Tailor Made album last year. The core of the band is really Horizon. with everything else added on top. and I see it as pretty much an extension of my writing for the small group, rather than a whole separate thing for big band. I want the players to approach it in that spirit as well.‘ (Kenny Mathieson)
Bobby Watson ’s Yiiilor Made Band play
on Sat 2. and he is a guest soloist with S YJO on Mon 4, bot/1 at the Mr‘lfii'ans 80/- Old Fruitntarket. Horizon are at
the City Cafe Bar. and the 29th Street
Saxophone Quartet play a free gig at
Princes Square. bot/i on Sun 3.
Horace Silver is back in business. The pianist is one of the biggest names in contemporary jazz, but his recent Columbia debut album was his first in ten years, and he has not been doing much touring. A frustrated attempt to set up his own record label, and a change of direction which saw him preoccupied with spiritual matters, largely accounts for his relative absence from the scene, but he is ready to do it all over again with his ten-piece Brass Ensemble.
“Ever since the early days with Kenny Durham and Art Blakey, I have worked with a quintet, and it will be real interesting to see how people react to 5 the bigger band, especially since we i will be playing mostly new material.
The gigs we have done in America
3 have been good, though, and I’m looking forward to coming to Scotland
' for the first time.’
Silver and brass
Silver is the man who put the funk into hard bop, and the new band emphasises that funkiness more strongly then many of his early units. He attributes that quality to the influence of blues, H & B and Latin music, as taken in and transformed by his own particular musical sensibility, and it has been a constant of his music over four decades.
‘I have been fortunate enough to be able to play my own compositions all through my career, which is quite unusual in jazz, and when l have done the odd standard, it’s been because I wanted to.’ Many of his tunes have become iazz classics, and he has arranged two of the best-known of them, ‘Song For My Father’ and ‘Sefior Blues’ (one appears on each of his Columbia albums), to complement the new material which his band will play
in Glasgow. (Joe Alexander)
r
Horace Silver
:— Open gate
: If there is such a thing as the ‘EGM sound’ — although the label’s founder, Manfred Eicher, gets impatient with the suggestion - then the three
musicians who form the trio Gateway
I have been at the forefront in creating
I it. Guitarist John Abercrombie, bass
player Dave Holland, and drummer
1 Jack DeJohnette are all (or have all been) core ECM artists.
Gateway was originally formed in
1975, and Abercrombie explained that ‘
the reunion had come about as a
i Dave Holland of Gateway
consequence of a one-off gig in
Woodstock a few months back. The ‘ musicians had discussed a possible ; tour next year, but the experience of ! playing together again, and a E fortuitous mid-summer gap in their 2 schedules, hastened the process.
‘Gateway began as a very free- wheeling band, a co-operative trio for sure, with no specific leader and the emphasis on an open-ended, freer
. approach to improvisation and trio
‘ playing. It’ll be interesting to see how Gateway fits now, because we haven’t played on a regular basis in quite a few years.
‘In the past, Dave Holland wrote most of the music, and we played very spontaneously. We are all writing material for this tour, though, and l - really don’t know what we will be into
yet — we have all changed a lot, and moved in different directions over the years, and all of that is likely to come i out.’
The intricate, highly interactive playing which characterised their two albums, ‘Gateway’ (1975) and ‘Gateway 2’ (1977), reflected the high standing of all three players, and a new recording is currently being planned for the autumn, although ECM’s committments mean that it is now likely to be a studio recording, rather than a live one as originally planned. (Kenny Mathieson)
Gateway play at the McEwans 80/- Old Fruitmarket on Sun 3.
Joe Temperley
It is entirely fitting that
; two of our three leading
jazz festivals should be
paying tribute to the
memory of trumpeter and arranger Jimmy Deuchar. who died last year shortly before a planned recording of his last major work.
Concerto for Joe was written for the l.ochgelly- born, New York-based baritone saxophonist Joe Temperley. The Glasgow concert will now feature its first performance.
played by Temperley with
‘ a ten-piece band of top
. British musicians. it was Alastair Robertson who
came up with the idea of the concerto for his l-liil’ Records label. and the
band will go into the studio immediately after the concert to record it.
Deuchar and Temperley are both liast Coast Scots — the trumpeter hailed from Dundee and both played in the Jack Parnell band in the early 50s. Their paths crossed intermittently again over the years. although 'l‘emperley's move to New York tirade those meetings infrequent. The ‘ combination of Deuchar's considerable arranging skills. and Teinperley‘s lush baritone sonority. should be an irresistible
Jimmy will also be remembered in his home town. in a concert at the Rep Theatre as part of the Dundee Jazz. Festival. which has now moved from its usual June setting to late August. Former sparring partners of the trumpeter. including Ronnie Scott and Stan 'l‘racey. will take part in that event. (Kenny Mathieson)
'I‘hc' Jimmy Deur'har Tribute is at the rile/{trans 8()/- Old IVruitnrar/(et on
i Thurs 7.
MARC MARNlli
20 The List 1—14 July 1994