Big Band Bow-Tie

Big Band Bow-Tie: Just for the Record

by Jack Bowers
January 1, 2001

Big Band Bow–Tie, which hails from southwestern Germany, is led by flugelhorn maestro Karl Farrent, a mainspring in that country’s SWR Big Band and BBB–T’s most accomplished soloist. As is true of almost every German band we’ve heard, Bow–Tie is in sync all the way, but the recording itself leaves much to be desired, shrouding the ensemble in a reverberant “concert hall” cocoon that tempers the sound and lessens its over–all impact. Farrent and the other soloists rise above that ...