Richard BISSILL
Los Jaraneros [7:16]
Jeremy LUBBOCK
Not Like This (arr. Bissill) [6:59]
FERGUSON/DOWNEY (arr. Bissill)
Give It One [3:40]
Richard BISSILL
Fat Belly Blues [5:41]
BLANE/MARTIN
The Trolley Song (arr. Bissill) [4:26]
Duke ELLINGTON/Billy STRAYHORN
Daydream (arr. Rattigan) [4:10]
Jim RATTIGAN
Caseoso [4:35]
Timothy JACKSON
Three Point Turn [4:07]
Lana's Lullaby [5:31]
Marvin HAMLISCH
The Way We Were (arr. Simcock) [9:32]
Billie HOLIDAY/HERZOG
God Bless The Child (arr. Simcock) [9:35]
Gwilym SIMCOCK
Blues For Hughie [7:48]
The London Horn Sound Big Band with Gwilym Simcock (piano), John Parricelli
(guitar), Sam Burgess (bass), Chris Baron (marimba) and Martin France
(drums);
Richard Bissill, Pip Eastop, Timothy Jackson, Jim Rattigan and Gwilym
Simcock (jazz horn soloists)
Geoffrey Simon (conductor)
rec. Air Studios, Hampstead, December 2007 with overdubs February 2008
The London Horn Sound Big Band announces itself as
the first ever big band of French horns. Altogether there are nineteen
virtuosi of the instrument on hand in this, the latest entrant in
Cala’s library of discs devoted to the ‘London Sound’ series.
The rationale is to cover some stylistic bases, to
present a unique sound tapestry, to showcase solo players and the
collective ensemble at its finest in versatile arrangements. The players
are all very well known – in addition to those noted in the head note
as the soloists you can find Anthony Halstead, Frank Lloyd, Nigel
Black and a phalanx of other quality-assessed virtuosos in the field.
Added spice comes from hot-to-trot pianist, arranger
and composer Gwilym Simcock whose jazz credentials here, whilst more
muted obviously than with his trio, still infuse the band.
Los Jaraneros starts thing with a funky Latin
workout. There are two jazz horn soloists and Simcock takes a solo.
A few observations, I hope not too critical. Simcock’s piano is too
backwardly placed for full effect, I’m not a great admirer of fade
endings (they’re lazy; end the tune if you started it) and to be blunt
for all the virtuosity and élan on display it’s hard timbrally and
expressively to tell the horn soloists – not just Eastop and Bissill
on this tune – one from another. That said I like Bissill’s atmospheric
solo in the tune he arranged, Not Like This. The band works
near its best on more extrovert and propulsive numbers which is why
the title track, Give It One, is successful – quick fire drums
from Martin France, a good arrangement and seriously good fun all
round. Fat Belly Blues seems to inspire the collective horns
to get ‘down home’, even if the simple lick is rather generic.
I also liked the way metres were varied. In The
Trolley Song there’s a back beat swing and a half tempo change
that break things up nicely. Ellington and Strayhorn must have had
Stormy Weather on their minds when they wrote the otherwise
somewhat forgettable Daydream. Rather more impressive is the
intriguingly voiced Three Point Turn which poaches a little
from the Jimmy Giuffre sound and layers things with a dash of Gil
Evans, anointed by some cod episodes that reveal a strong sense of
trio and brass playing humour. Things are perhaps taken to extremes
in Simcock’s arrangement of Marvin Hamlisch’s The Way We Were.
It’s a very busy arrangement and takes its teasing Erroll Garnerish
allusiveness to grandiose heights. Still less was I taken by what
Simcock does to Billie Holiday’s God Bless The Child. His attempts
at tone poem impressionism sound inflated. Still, we end with a swinger,
Blues for Hughie, which has some fugal passages and the only
bass solo in the twelve tracks. Both these features are underused
on this date I think. In fact the trio with horns aspect is only partially
realised as a concept.
So some hits and misses here. Fine sound. There’s also
an opportunity to download Tim Jackson’s Sound of Music Jazz Suite,
which I recommend you do. My foot tapped.
Jonathan Woolf
CD Reviews
CALA
CACD 0117 [73:41]
