Tag / John Coltrane

by mikeraggett

Super Saturday in Southend

It was freezing cold outside but the temperature inside the Jazz Centre UK’s Southend premises soared on Saturday 11 January as Alan Skidmore joined Anthony Kerr, Dominic Howles and Trevor Taylor for a special concert of music by Coltrane, Monk and Miles. The Centre holds an amazing collection of jazz memorabilia to which Alan contributed back in 2017 when he was honoured by the Centre. He repaid the compliment with a great afternoon of high quality jazz.

To kick things off Anthony Kerr on vibraphone played a set with Dominic on bass and Trevor at the drum kit. Anthony’s improvisations on standards like Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn’s Isfahan are always enchanting and were greeted with enthusaistic applause, as were all the tunes in this opening set.

After a short break the trio were joined by Alan for an hour long set of superb variety. We all know that Alan can play more notes per second than most but he is also a sensitive interpreter of ballads as we learned from the 1999 album with the Hannover Philharmonie symphony orchestra After the Rain which you can get from Miles Music, now run by Peter Watts, or on Amazon if you must. The set started with the lively Thelonius Monk tune Nutty followed by the lovely John Coltrane ballad Lonnie’s Lament (see below). Mikes Davis’s catchy So What followed – it’s the first track on the iconic Kind of Blue album – and this segued into another Coltrane favourite of Alan’s Impressions. They finished with Duke Ellington’s Take the Coltrane and Blue Monk another characteristically jagged and captivating Thelonius composition.

The Stage is set … with Humphrey Lyttleton’s trumpet foreground
Jazz Centre UK’s Digby Fairweather introduces Alan
The audience were delighted
Alan, Dominic and Anthony

And for those of you who missed out on this fantastic gig here’s a short three minute taster from the ballad Lonnie’s Lament. It starts at the end of Anthony Kerr’s fine solo and features Alan’s lyrical solo and conclusion.

Words, photographs and video courtesy of Mike Raggett

by mikeraggett

AS, AK and KB

COME IN OUT OF THE COLD! Saturday 11 January sees Alan joining his good friend and outstanding vibraphone player Antony Kerr for a special gig at the National Jazz Centre in Southend. Here’s more info. It’s from 14:00 to 16:00 in this fascinating location filled with jazz memorabilia, information, archives, workshops and live music. Come on down and hear their take on the music of Coltrane, Miles and Monk.

Skid and Anthony as a duet on a previous occasion at Jazz Centre UK. This time he’s a guest with the Anthony Kerr Trio.

2024 concluded with a rather unusual request for Alan to participate in a podcast. It took him back to 1976 when he was booked to record the iconic solo on the song The Saxophone Man on the album The Kick Inside that shot the teenaged Kate Bush to fame.

Professor Darrell Babidge, Chair of the Faculty of Vocal Arts at the prestigious Juillard School in New York runs the Kate Bush Fan Podcast and asked Alan to recall the session. It will doubtless introduce a whole new audience to a different kind of music too. Darrell asked if he could play out the podcast with a favourite track of Alan’s. He chose Giant Steps acknowledged to be the hardest tune in jazz to play. You can listen here. Enjoy!

by mikeraggett

We’ll remember Coltrane – 1983 style

Alan was rooting through his archives – something of a habit after the reception to the CD Boxset A Supreme Love – when he found a VHS tape (remember those?) labelled Baden-Baden 1983. It contained some rare footage recorded by the German TV Station Südwest Funk. It was part of a week-long workshop under the title we’ll Remember Coltrane which Alan did in that year in Baden-Baden. The week culminated in a concert hall in Mainz. Gathered here were some of the great names of European jazz: Albert Mangelsdorf, Tomasz Stanko and a whole raft of saxophone players including Alan himself. They were joined by Rashied Ali from the USA who had played as a drummer with John Coltrane so the connection was very real for all concerned. The presenter Joachim Ernst Behrendt introduces each of the saxophone players who will solo and we hear the introduction to My Favourite Things a song Coltrane usually played on soprano saxophone although the opening here is on tenors.

We’ve edited the session down so as to feature Alan’s solo, following on from his great friend Gerd Dudek, in which he squeezes some wonderful phrases out of the top end of the soprano. Have a listen.

And if you want to hear more from Alan’s archive – A Supreme Love has sold out in the CD version but you can download all or individual tracks from Confront Recordings.

by mikeraggett

A Supreme Love makes Jazzwise magazine’s top 20

The six-CD boxset of Alan Skidmore’s life as a musician has made it into the influential magazine Jazzwise’s Top 20 Reissues and Archive albums of 2023. And with the vast majority of tracks (more than 80%) previously unreleased it leans heavily towards the Archive rather than the Reissues sector.

With his inspiration, John Coltrane, featuring twice in the list and colleagues Stan Tracey, Sony Rollins and Kenny Wheeler also listed, Skid is in very good company. There are a very few copies left so if you don’t want to miss out on one of the albums of the year head over to Confront Recordings to get your copy.

Since writing this the physical box set has sold out but all tracks are available to download from the link above.

Watch this space for other year end awards that may come in for this superb collection.

November in Southend

And in other news, Alan joined outstanding vibraphone player and good friend Anthony Kerr for an impromptu gig at The Jazz Centre UK in Southend at the beginning of November. Long-term collaborators in Georgie Fame’s New Blue Flames it was great to hear the two playing together in this intimate space.

by mikeraggett

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.

by mikeraggett

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.

by mikeraggett

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.

Alan Skidmore and Nat Birchall
Alan soloing on Ascension
Everybody on stage for Ascension

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.

Six CDs, an illuminating booklet and my signed box.

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

by mikeraggett

A new departure

Sunday sun and showers in Hoxton surrounded an enterprising gig at the Hundred Years Gallery.

Percussionist and record producer Mark Wastell teamed up with tenor saxophone legend Alan Skidmore for a unique duo for saxophone and percussion.

The gallery’s basement holds about 25-30 people about half of whom seemed to be tenor sax players keen to experience this unique pairing. In his introduction, Mark recalled his first exposure to Skid’s music over thirty years ago and the striking and long-lasting impression it had on him.

For his part Alan warned that it had been two years since he’d played in public and that was in front of a full house at the Royal Albert Hall in the company of 60 other saxophonists in the tribute to Ronnie Scott.

Well with this line up it was always going to be a bit different. Added to which they had not rehearsed or ever played together except in a big ensemble number at Café Oto’s Coltrane tribute a few years back.

Since his childhood, Alan has always been passionate about the drums although his dad warned him off the seat with the advice: “You’ll always be first in and last out of the gig” but today he had several opportunities to play percussion alongside Mark whose array of drums, gongs, bells, shruti box and assorted devices must take him hours to stow and transport.

The first set began quietly and built into a sensuous soundscape which formed a base for Alan to join in with his tenor. There was a blues and ballad feel at the start but then, prompted by Mark’s ever-changing swirling textures and urgent beats, the Alan of SOS days emerged seeming to revel in free improvisation once again.

The second set featured a lot of call and response with ideas being thrown across the room between two musicians who were clearly enjoying each other’s company.Some of Mark’s sounds reminded me of Japan and at other times the duo took me off to the Africa of Ubizo, Alan’s collaboration with South African musicians from back in the early 2000s. The session just pointed up Mark’s ability to create a huge variety of sounds and Alan’s versatility on his instrument with lush melodic passages interspersed with honks and squeals, scales and octave leaps.

It included a sequence with both of them creating wonderful patterns on the drums. There were inevitably echoes of Coltrane from the tenor most notably with A Love Supreme featuring strongly towards the end.

An afternoon thoroughly enjoyed by all present. Let’s hope they can repeat it on a larger stage before too long.

© 2021 text and photographs Mike Raggett WATCH THIS SPACE – SOME VIDEO CLIPS MAYBE ADDED SOON

by mikeraggett

The Spirit lives on

John Coltrane may well have died on 17 July – indeed, sadly, he did 52 years ago – but on 17 July 2019 his spirit was evident at Café Oto for a 52nd anniversary commemorative concert featuring the Alan Skidmore Quartet. This event was organised by musician and producer Mark Wastell of Confront Recordings who had invited Alan to play at the previous concert in 2017 which marked fifty years since Coltrane’s death and which subsequently featured as a Confront CD set.

Quartet and audience

The Alan Skidmore Quartet

This year it was an all-Coltrane evening spread over three magnificent sets.

 

In the first of these Alan’s regular quartet featuring Steve Melling on piano, Andrew Cleyndert on double bass and Miles Levin on drums enchanted the audience with a continuous performance of three tracks from the seminal album A Love Supreme. They started with Resolution, segued into Pursuance and brought the first part of the evening to a close with the rarely performed Psalm. The last strains of this died away into one of those moments of enraptured silence before the extended applause broke out.

Skid Psalm

Alan plays Psalm

In his introduction Alan had explained that he couldn’t stand up for long periods because of having a leg full of steel rods which resulted from an accident some 40 years ago. So, Alan sat out the second set while the Steve Melling trio were joined by guest tenor saxophonist Ed Jones. Remaining with Coltrane material they treated us to blues and ballads including Mr Day from Coltrane Plays The Blues from 1962, Central Park West from Coltrane’s Sound released in 1964 and Moment’s Notice from the early Blue Trane from 1957.

Trio with audience

Steve Melling Trio

Ed

Ed Jones

The final set saw Alan with the quartet playing one of his most popular numbers After the Rain which Alan recorded with a full orchestra on the album with the same name in 1998. Utterly spellbinding in quieter ballad mode, Alan then wrapped up the evening by asking Ed Jones and Howard Cottle (who had featured alongside Alan in Paul Dunmall’s Sun Ship Quartet two years earlier) to join him on the stage. The intensity, inventiveness and variety of these three tenor sax masters on Transition from the epynymous posthumous album. But they did not overshadow Melling, Cleyndert and especially Miles Levin who all made huge contributions to this barnstorming end to a fabulous evening.

If there is an afterlife, JC would have been smiling broadly and applauding this wonderful tribute.

Finale WS

The finale with (l-r) Steve Melling, Ed Jones, Alan Skidmore, Andrew Cleyndert, Howard Cottle and Miles Levin

Ed, Skid, Howard
The three tenors

UPDATE    27 August 2019

At the Café Oto gig was renowned jazz journalist and reviewer John Fordham. He obviously enjoyed the evening and wrote this for the September issue of Jazzwise  magazine.Jazzwise Cafe Oto review