22 March 2025Guitarists reflect on people, places and events for Edinburgh gig
Though better known as one of the UK’s leading and most decorated poets, Paterson has had a second career as guitarist for many years. In the mid-1980s he moved to London to join the free-improv scene, where he took lessons with the great guitar maverick Derek Bailey. For twelve years he co-led the Celtic-jazz ensemble Lammas with saxophonist Tim Garland, playing classical and 12-string guitars and sharing stages and studios with top jazz players including trumpet master Kenny Wheeler, vibraphone virtuoso Joe Locke, and pianist Jason Rebello. As well as collections of poetry and aphorisms, he has published an enthusiastically received memoir, Toy Fights.
Graeme Stephen’s versatility has taken him into folk and world music as well as jazz of many different styles. His long partnership with piper, saxophonist and whistle virtuoso Fraser Fifield has been hugely productive and his talent for creating new soundtracks for classic films from the 1920s has won him admirers in different art forms. As a composer he has also worked with the Dutch string quartet Zapp4 and enjoyed critical success with albums including Vantage Points, where he expressed in music the geographical locations that moved and influenced him.
Stephen was a crucial member of the Dutch-Scottish group Lolanders and since 2014 he has been a central figure in the jazz collective Playtime, performing new music and honouring jazz masters from Charlie Parker to Bill Frisell.
04 March 2025Argyll promoter announces Spring concert season
Melfort Music is bringing top line traditional and classical musicians to Kilmerford and Kilninver Village Hall in Argyll in a programme of concerts taking place from March to June.
Fiddler Lauren Collier and her band open the series on Saturday 15th March and other musicians booked include guitar-mandolin duo Jenn Butterworth & Laura Beth Salter, fiddle, harp cello, step dancing and vocal quartet Atlantic Crossing, fiddle master Duncan Chisholm with Hamish Napier, and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra Wind Soloists.
Founded by Matthew Anderson in 2024, Melfort Music's mission is to bring outstanding performers to Kilmelford, Melfort, and Netherlorne. The Spring season is being made possible thanks to sponsorship from local businesses and says Anderson, offers audiences a chance to experience the very best in folk, classical, and traditional music.
Tickets are available through Melfort Music's website.
26 February 2025Livia Records ushers in new era for Irish jazz
Dublin-based Livia Records releases its first album of a new era when saxophonist Michael Buckley’s Ebb and Flow hits the streets on Friday 28th February.
Set up originally to release the music of the late Irish jazz guitar virtuoso, Louis Stewart, Livia ceased trading with the death of its founder, Gerald Davis, in 2005. The label was reactivated by Dublin radio presenter and music enthusiast Dermot Rogers in 2021 and albums including Stewart’s legendary solo album, Out on His Own, and his debut recording, Louis the First, were re-released.
Following the release of a previously unknown duo recording by Stewart and the great American guitarist Jim Hall, Rogers moved to promote musicians on the current Irish scene.
Ebb and Flow, which features the vastly experienced Buckley alongside pianist Greg Felton, bassist Barry Donohue and drummer Shane O’Donovan, is launched at Arthur’s Blues and Jazz Club in Dublin on Thursday, 27th February.
It will be released in tandem with the reissue of Dublin pianist Jim Doherty’s Spondance, which was recorded in Los Angeles in 1986 and features Louis Stewart and Doherty in an octet with top LA players including trumpeter Bobby Shew and saxophonist Bob Sheppard.
05 February 2025Top Scandi-US team, Neil Cowley and Koln Concert @ 50 set for Aberdeen Jazzfest
The all-star Scandinavian-American quartet Portable Infinity, pianist Neil Cowley’s trio, Jazz FM favourite, singer Georgia Cecile, and saxophonist Phil Bancroft’s new group, The Beautiful Storm are among the attractions announced for Aberdeen Jazz Festival 2025.
Running from Thursday 13th to Sunday 23rd March, the festival utilises established jazz venues including the Blue Lamp and the Lemon Tree as well as reaching into the local community with concerts at Bon Accord Baths and the Great Western Community Centre.
Portable Infinity brings together two leading Swedish musicians – pianist Jacob Karlzon and former EST drummer Magnus Ostrom – with the outstanding American bassist Scott Colley and Danish saxophonist Benjamin Koppel to play at the Blue Lamp on Thursday 20th March.
The Neil Cowley Trio, who recently returned after a seven-year break with the enthusiastically received album, Entity, also appears at the popular Gallowgate venue, as do saxophonists Zhenya Strigalev, Matt Carmichael and Phil Bancroft and singer Niki King. Elsewhere pianist Brian Kellock duets with trumpeter Colin Steele and pianist Dorian Ford recreates Keith Jarrett’s groundbreaking Koln Concert in a 50th anniversary concert at Cowdray Hall on Sunday 23rd.
22 January 2025Saxophonist Molley releases Indo-jazz collaboration, Journeys
Saxophonist Brian Molley releases his fifth album, Journeys, on Friday 7th February.
Journeys features Molley's internationally acclaimed quartet in collaboration with the Asin Langa Ensemble from Northern India and was recorded in a custom-built studio in the heart of the Western Rajasthani desert.
Molley's quartet first performed alongside Asin’s group at RIFF in Jodhpur in 2015 as part of an extensive tour in India. The two groups blended perfectly, fusing Molley’s compositions with traditional Indian folk songs, and were rapturously received. A second collaboration during an extended trip to Rajasthan for Molley's group from Scotland, resulted in Journeys.
A former Jazzwise magazine One to Watch, Molley formed his quartet in 2012. Their enthusiastically received debut album, Clock was released the following year and was described by BBC Radio 3 as ‘a well-crafted and classy debut’.
Subsequent albums have included Colour and Movement, from 2017, Modern Traditions, from 2021, and 2022's Indo-European fusion collaboration with Indian percussionist Krishna Kishor, Intercontinental.
22 January 2025Live 1969 Surman recording set for release
Cuneiform Records release a double CD of recordings by veteran British saxophonist John Surman on January 31.