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New world – familiar venue
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The Reviews are Rolling in for A Supreme Love
And as the box set looks back at Alan’s six decades of making music we’ve added some pages to the website to chart the places he’s played and the people he’s played with during that time. Check them out from the links.
The six CDs in this smart-looking box set reflect 70 years of tenor saxophonist Alan Skidmore’s playing career. The collection comprises 46 performances selected from the many live concert, radio and studio recordings he’s made over the years.
Read Brian Payne’s full review here
Look out for a massive retrospective from England’s greatest Coltranian as Mark Wastell’s remarkable avant-garde Confront label is issuing a vast record of achievement by Alan Skidmore entitled A Supreme Love Read the full preview here
Given the nearly fifty tracks on this set, attempts to pick a few highlights result in many changes of mind. However, “Nature Boy” and “I Remember Clifford” from the jazz- with-strings album, After the Rain (Miles Music 1998), with Colin Towns’ arrangements, are wonderful examples of Skidmore’s consummate ballad playing. The three tracks from Montreux 1969 that would later appear on Skidmore’s first album as leader, Once Upon a Time (Deram, 1970), inevitably rank very highly.
Yet, one suspects that fans will turn quickly to “Directions” from a Weather Report performance for Nordeutscher Rundfunk in 1971 with the addition of Skidmore, saxophonist John Surman and trombonist Eje Thelin. The fact that Skidmore damn near steals the show is confirmation of his remarkable abilities but that a whole concert exists somewhere is ear-tinglingly exciting. Read Duncan Heining’s review and interview with Skid here.
British musicians of this generation routinely put wry faces when they get rave reviews for music they made 50 years ago, but damn! What a legacy. A beautifully put together tribute to a real soldier of the road. Read Brian Morton’s full review here.
On the back of the box that houses the magnificent music within, producer Mark Wastell asks: “How do you represent a seven-decade career in only six CDs?” Well, the simple answer is you can’t, but Wastell has had a good go at it and in the process unearthed a cornucopia of previously unreleased material.
Read Nick Lea’s full review here
Very nearly all the material on this six CD extravaganza celebrating the marvellous tenor sax player Alan Skidmore – an eminent figure in UK modern jazz for decades – is previously unreleased and has come out of his private collection. […] OK Alan what other treasures are lying in the vaults and can we have them please? Read Russell Newmark’s full review here.
It’s testament to the richness of Skid’s considerable output over the years that this box set of almost entirely unreleased material devotes a whole disc to each of the six decades in which he’s been active – and never once lets up in intensity.
Read Daniel Spicer’s full review here.
And you can buy a digital download of this amazing 6 CD box set here.
Skid’s 6 CD Box set released
Everybody else can now share my pleasure in listening to 60 years of Alan Skidmore making wonderful music. The 6 CD Box set previewed at the Cafe Oto gig is now available from Mark Wastell’s Confront Recordings.
And what value is is too. A base price of £32 (you can pay more if you like) means that each CD is only a fiver. And each CD contains incredibly generous tracks of largely unpublished material plus one or two favourites from Alan’s albums over the years. Add to this a 20-page informative booklet by Richard Williams charting Skid’s life and music and it’s a truly outstanding package.
Don’t delay – get it today. Click HERE to get a digital download of this amazing compilation. The physical CD Box Set has sold out but you can still enjoy the music.
Birthday Bonanza
21 April 2023 was a very significant date. There was a star-studded gig at London’s Café Oto called Impressions of John Coltrane. It was celebrating 60 years since the release of John Coltrane’s revered album Impressions. And another album was previewd that night in Dalston: A Supreme Love a six CD box set covering six decades of playing by Alan Skidmore. Oh, and it also happened to be Alan’s 81st birthday. Quite a night!
As the poster suggested, there were three groups in the evening’s line up. A trio with Ed Jones on tenor sax, Dominic Lash on bass and Mark Wastell on a splendid array of percussion instruments. Mark was also the organiser of the whole thing. This was a contemplative, free improvisatory set which meandered in and out of Coltrane’s 1966 composition The Father and The Son and The Holy Ghost and set the scene for the evening very well. Next up was the David Angol Quartet with David on tenor and soprano saxes and they were joined by Alan Skidmore for a spirited rendition of the tune Impressions. After a short break the final set was played by the Nat Birchall Quintet. Nat is another long-time admirer of Coltrane’s work and also invited Alan to join the quintet for a Coltrane tune Selflessness in which where the interplay between the players was really intense and dramatic.
The finale with everybody on stage was a barnstorming Ascension and brought to an end a brilliant evening of quality jazz dedicated to the memory of the all-time great composer and saxophonist John Coltrane. What a night!
A highlight for me was being able to purchase the first copy to be sold of the CD box set and have Alan sign it for me. A prized possession which contains a fascinating journey over six decades of Skid’s development as a musician. The story is elegantly traced by Richard Williams in the comprehensive booklet of sleeve notes. Highly recommended – as only 8 of the 46 tracks included have been published before so it’s a truly unique opportunity to hear the range of Alan’s playing from early days with his dad through to recent Coltrane commemorative (or thank you) gigs in 2019.
The whole project – box set and concert – was masterminded by Mark Wastell’s Confront Recordings label from which you can also buy this amazing testimonial to a great tenor saxophone player when it goes on official release in a couple of weeks’ time.
Watch this space for the date.
Words and images Mike Raggett April 2023
52 Years ago …
One October morning in 1969 Alan Skidmore arrived at Lansdowne Studios to record an album of new compositions by his friend Stan Tracey. Alan was fairly newly arrived on the jazz scene having served his Blues Apprenticeship with John Mayall and Alexis Korner but he knew Stan from listening to him as house pianist as Ronnie Scott’s Club after popping round there between his sets at The Talk of the Town.
Stan’s earlier Jazz Suite inspired by Dylan Thomas’s Under Milk Wood has been a huge success and today’s material was Stan’s take on the Shakespearian theme from Jacques speech in As You Like It. The sixteen-piece Stan Tracey Big Band recorded eight tracks that were released in September 1970 as The Seven Ages of Man on Columbia Records. It did well but over the years fell out of print.
Jump forward to 2020 and Stan’s son Clark Tracey has produced a digitally remastered version of this session and one recorded with a quartet a month before as a double CD Wisdom in the Wings. Released in January 2021 it presents a fascinating opportunity to revisit some early Tracey material.
Alan has a solo on the first track ‘All the Worlds a Stage’ described as ‘ferocious’ by sleeve note writer Simon Spillett. Both CDs are well worth a listen with superb sound quality in this reissue. You can buy them from Resteamed Records as CDs or downloads and from other suppliers.
Over his long career Alan collaborated with Stan Tracey in a number of formats: with the Big Band, an Octet and a tour in which they performed piano and saxophone duets which they took to the Edinburgh Jazz Festival.
Seventy Seventh Heaven
Skid celebrates his birthday on 21 April and this year’s prize presents from his wife Kay and granddaughter Naima are proudly featured on Easter Sunday. Elvin Jones is Skid’s next jazz hero after John Coltrane and to wear him proudly on his chest is a real privilege. He also got to play with Elvin on several occasions so the connection is really meaningful.
Family is also important to Alan and to be given a “Greatest Grandad in the World” cap by Naima was an added pleasure.
Nothing for it now but to head off to the pub for a celebratory pint.
MEMORIAL MEMORIES
John Coltrane 50th Memorial Concert CD released
In 1987 Alan Skidmore was honoured to be invited to play at the Fairfield Halls in Croydon at a John Coltrane memorial concert on the same bill as McCoy Tyner, Freddie Hubbard and Elvin Jones who were regulars in Coltrane’s various groups. That concert celebrated his music 20 years after his death.
Then on 17 July 2017 Alan Skidmore joined the Paul Dunmall Sun Ship Quartet at Café Oto in Dalston, London in a special concert to commemorate on the day of the 50th anniversary of John Coltrane’s passing.
The evening was recorded and a CD featuring the performances from that evening has just been released on Mark Wastell’s Confront Recordings Core label. In addition to the Paul Dunmall and Alan Skidmore sets there is an opening piece from a newly formed trio of Danish flautist Julie Kjaer, Ståle Liavik Solberg a percussionist from Norway and Mark Wastell also on percussion. This trio also joins the Dunmall/Skidmore ensemble for a finale of Coltrane’s Ascension after all the songs from Sun Ship have been performed. This whole double CD set makes for a great listen and a fitting commemoration of Coltrane’s unique jazz legacy.
And on 17 July 2019 Alan will again return to Café Oto with his own quartet: Steve Melling at the piano, Andy Cleyndert on the double bass and Miles Levin at the drums with saxophonist Ed Jones making a special guest appearance. It will without doubt be another night to remember with the presence of John Coltrane inspiring the performances. You’d better book early.
TREBLE DUTCH
In what is billed as the Saxophone Summit, Alan Skidmore will join alto and soprano saxophonist Tineke Postma and alto player Benjamin Herman in a series of concerts in the Netherlands during late February and early March. Alan is delighted to be reunited with the pianist Rein de Graaff’s superb trio with Marius Beets on bass and Eric Ineke on drums with whom he has enjoyed many gigs over the years. The two young saxophone partners in this series are also highly accomplished performers.
Tineke Postma studied at the Amsterdam Conservatory and the Manhattan School of Music in New York. She has played with Greg Osby, Geri Allen, Scott Colley and Terri Lyne Carrington and has released six CDs to date. In 2015 she was awarded the Boy Edgar Prize the top award for jazz musicians in the Netherlands.
In a similar pathway Benjamin Herman studied at Hilversum Conservatory before going to the Manhattan School of Music. His musical career has involved founding the New Cool Collective an eight-piece band with soul, jazz and Latin influences. He is also a recipient of the Boy Edgar Prize in 2003 and has some 20 albums with the New Cool Collective and a similar number as leader of a variety of small groups.
Dates so far announced are Bimhuis Amsterdam on Saturday 3 March at 20:30 and
Tivoli Vredenburg Utrecht on Sunday 4 March at 16:00
Others will be added as they are announced but these are bound to be memorable concerts with Alan’s brilliant tenor playing added to two talented younger players and a trio that has backed Alan on numerous occasions. There’s no better excuse for a quick trip to Amsterdam and/or one of the Netherlands’ hidden gems the wonderful city of Utrecht.
Alan Skidmore 