London Jazz Festival Saturday 22nd

My Saturday at the festival again was centered around the South Bank.  First up in the Purcell Room was Tommy Smith, making a welcome return from last weeks concerts with the SYJO. Here joined by regular trio partners Arild Andersen on bass and Paolo Vinaccia on drums and percussion.  I saw them perform earlier this year at Brecon and they were excellent then - at the sound check here they were again really cooking and playing some really great music.

John Law then took his turn to set up and the tempo and mood was changed in a different direction - Law is another of our great pianist/composers and his work has great feeling and beauty to it.  With Asaf Sirkus on drums and Sam Burgess on bass they were playing lyrical and melodic music with great passion.  This would with hindsight have been the pick of the shows to have had a seat for.




Later in the evening I moved over to the Festival Hall where there was much excitement surrounding the evenings show featuring in the second half the Bays & The Heritage Orchestra, but starting with a set from Composer John Metcalfe.

Metcalfe and band took the stage in dark suits and never acknowledged the audience - their concentration focused on the set to come.  The instruments were two violins, bass, drums and electronics with I think lighting effects from Adam Seaman.  This was a real revelation - the music although dark, brooding and at times menacing was never less than totally enthralling.  There were sweeping chords, angular spikes and terrific changes of pace in the writing and the almost coldness of the players just added to the mystery inherent in the music.  Sounding a tiny little bit like Tangerine Dream/Robert Miles and looking a little like Ron & Russ Mael, well you get the picture.

The last show was the Bays and Heritage Orchestra.  I'm sure Tottenham Court Road could not display as much computer hardware as was on stage for this show tonight. With a multi screen backdrop and cameras all over the place it promised to be a visual and aural delight.

A  friend of mine, Madli,  who had come over for the festival was so excited to see this show as she is heavily into Avant Garde free form improvisation and this on paper ticked all her boxes.

Jules Buckley was leading the Heritage Orchestra working from notation put on screens in front of him and the musicians in real time - so no rehearsal or practice with this set -the bays at the back of the stage playing various electronics along with drum and bass.

It started quite well and the first piece had interesting movement and direction  but sadly (for me anyway) it all went down hill from here as the music became so samey and directionless.

Things  got worse when after the introduction of a deafening electro drum beat, 'whoops and hollers' from the crowd galvanised Jules into gesturing to the audience to make more noise.

To be fair the audience were into this beat, the guys in seats next to here I was sitting on the floor, made copious visits to the bar to bring back beer and supplies, were texting their wives /girlfriends, discussing England's pathetic attempts at rugby and no doubt telling them all what a great show they were in.  Towards the end the more adventurous in the audience got up for some dancing, mostly next to the speaker stack, so they could hear the music more clearly no doubt.

I left at the end feeling shattered, deaf and with a numb bum tingling with the vibrations that you only get with wooden floors and electronic bass lines.  As I patiently waited for Madli to come out and explain all this new technological music to me I couldn't help but think how often my own computer equipment crashes or hangs and how really bad it would be for musicians who now rely on these items for more and more of their music - and in this case a crash would probably have been terminal.

With all that going around in my head and the still numbness in my rear I got a bleep on my phone which was a message from Madli timed about 10 minutes after the show started 'I'll be outside now'. 

Did anyone notice the pianist on the right of stage?  I was only looking at his back and there was no light on him at all, but was it Neil Cowley?  Certainly looked like him, sadly he must have had another gig as he left half way through the show.