The British Block

We felt that there would be some value in looking at the vibrant jazz scene outside of the US. We could have chosen any of a large number of British originals. Courtney Pine, Graham Collier, Colin Towns, John McLaughlin etc, etc. The four chosen are all interesting in their own right for different reasons and are not necessarily typical examples of the British scene or even that well known.

For example Juilian Joseph is known for his jazz broadcasting but is a prodigious talent as a player. Anyone who has had the privilege of hearing him will attest to that. The Jazz Warriors, which, as you probably know, was the Black London based jazz workshop that produced a table of great talents such as Joseph, Crosby and of course Courtney Pine.

It is also debatable to find a British style. We have such a strong rock tradition, which was itself highly influenced by jazz and blues, that our jazz often has a funkier element to it. Ian Carr very much tried to do this with his band Nucleus in the 70s.

The Ballemy, Brueford, Bates piece is interesting as they were the founder members of Earthworks which really came out of the progressive rock / British jazz scene in the 80s. Bill Brueford, who wrote much of the music came to fame as drummer for Yes and then King Crimson. Technically brilliant the music displays rock and western classical influences and is highly (densely?) composed. Bates and Ballemy were stars of the mainly white big band Loose Tubes that our own Julian Nicholas became a member of. Django Bates is, of course, an eminent and brilliant British composer with a unique sound of his own.

Courtney Pines recent albums have been very influenced by Caribbean music. Younger talents include Fin Peters and Dave Stapleton. Stapleton set up Edition Records which is one of the best contemporary jazz record labels in the UK but Dave is a busy composer too who now produces scores for a number of different environments.

Most of these artists have performed in Brighton at various times. We hope that the workshop tunes, if you are not already familiar with them, will give you a flavour of what is happening in the UK.