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Malcolm Griffiths
Mike Westbrook Concert Band: Marching Song Volumes 1 & 2 Plus Bonus Tracks
by Maurizio Comandini
Mike Westbrook, pianista e soprattutto direttore di orchestra, è nato il 21 marzo del 1936 a High Wycombe, 50 chilometri a nord-ovest di Londra. Dapprima tentato dalla Art School di Plymouth, si dedica poi con decisione alla musica, dalla fine degli anni cinquanta. Nel 1958 forma la sua prima band per la quale gli capita di reclutare il sedicenne John Surman, giovane talento emergente che stava terminando il suo percorso scolastico. Quattro anni dopo Westbrook si sposta a Londra per ...
read moreMike Gibbs: Revisiting Tanglewood 63: The Early Tapes
by Chris May
With British jazz in 2021 in better shape than ever before, record companies are being emboldened to revisit their tape libraries and reissue historic but long deleted albums. At the same time, recently formed specialist labels such as Jazz In Britain are making available club and radio broadcast recordings which have never been released before. The Rhodesian-born, Berklee-schooled orchestral-jazz composer Michael Gibbs, a truly iconic figure who continues to inspire young British musicians, is receiving attention on both fronts.
read moreMike Westbrook Concert Band: Marching Song Volumes 1 & 2 Plus Bonus Tracks
by Roger Farbey
It's hardly surprising that Mike Westbrook reigned supreme in the latter quarter of the 1960s and early 70s. His big band was voted top of that category in the late-lamented Melody Maker British jazz polls for 1970 (and the two years either side of that). In the same year, his third album, Marching Song, recorded a year earlier came third in the category LP Of The Year" (the number one album that year was John McLaughlin's seminal Extrapolation so there ...
read moreMalcolm Griffiths: A Man For All Seasons
by Duncan Heining
We talk often of the stars, like 'Trane and Miles. We remember the bandleaders, such as Basie and Duke. We even recall the composers and arrangers, Ellington again, Gil Evans and Monk. And we never forget those star soloists like Johnny Hodges or Lester Young. But the guys in the machine room, the guys who make their leaders' visions real time and again are all too often just an afterthought. Yet stop and think about what made those ...
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