Doors 7:45 PM, Music 8:30 PM – 2 set(s) of music
Line-up:
Nathaniel Catchpole – Tenor saxophone
Jamie Coleman – Trumpet
N O Moore – Electric guitar
Dominic Lash – Double bass
Eddie Prévost – Drum kit
About
It’s difficult to ignore jazz altogether. A lot of people study it at college and end up with their own Youtube channel, explaining the circle of fifths, what to play on a minor 7 flat 5 chord, tritone substitutions, etc. Useful. Putting things together like Meccano is a way to mark time. This quintet does not really do that, although each of its members could probably run their own Youtube channel if they wanted. Instead, in this ensemble, they focus on the exuberance of art, using craft to search for, to briefly capture, and to express the sheer beauty and terror of being alive. Other than that, it’s difficult to sum them up in a festival friendly soundbite. At times, it might well sound like jazz, but at others it won’t. In other words, this ensemble deals with at least two questions at once: what can you do with a jazz type ensemble if you are not playing jazz?; and, so what if that turns out to be something related to jazz anyway?
Jamie Coleman Is an improvising trumpeter exploring the full gamut of sounds from jazz inflected melodicism to full abstraction. He is a regular on the London scene with ongoing projects alongside Eddie Prevost and Ross Lambert.
Nat Catchpole has been involved in London’s free improvisation scene for two and a half decades, exploring the extremes of saxophone technique while deeply rooted in the history of the instrument; playing with musicians such as Paul Rutherford, John Edwards, Steve Reid, Alan Wilkinson, Steve Noble, Tetuzi Akiyama and Mark Sanders.
NO Moore is an electric guitarist informed by improvisation, rock, jazz, and modern classical and electronic music. Notable collaborators include Sue Lynch,Henry Kaiser, John Butcher, Caroline Kraabel, Roger Turner, Rachel Musson, Ray Russell, Steve Noble, Alan Wilkinson, Phil Durrant.
Dominic Lash is a double-bassist and guitarist. His most regular current collaborators include John Butcher, Angharad Davies, Heather Roche, Pat Thomas, and Alex Ward.
Eddie Prévost is an English percussionist best known as a founding member of the influential free improvisation group AMM. He began his musical journey in skiffle and jazz, eventually co-founding AMM in 1965 with Lou Gare and Keith Rowe, later joined by Cornelius Cardew and John Tilbury. Prévost’s approach emphasizes exploration and discovery over convention, central to both AMM’s aesthetic and his long-running London improvisation workshop.
‘Coleman’s slow trumpet lines had a tenderness that evoked more physical kinds of intimacy. The trumpet became breath, warmth, vibration in a way that got the skin prickling, the senses suddenly sharpened.’ The Wire
‘Moore shifts fluidly from argumentatively fractured jazz licks to spacey atmospherics to mad cat hisses; the appositeness of his contributions belies the sparseness of his recorded discography’ The Wire
“[Prevost’s] free drumming flows superbly making perfect use of his formidable technique, but his most startling feature is his stylelessness. It’s as though there has never been an Elvin Jones or a Max Roach.”
– review of a set with saxophonist Lou Gare, Melody Maker (27.03.1975)