To many, the jazz-funk idiom is strictly the preserve of American musicians and groups such as Lonnie Liston Smith, Bob James, George Benson and The Crusaders. And while there is a certain truth in that, let us not forget that in Britain at the end of the ’70s there too was a thriving jazz-funk scene, which came to be spearheaded by bands like Shakatak and Level 42. This Vocalion reissue presents two albums from the Harvest archives – EMI’s progressive music label – both of which proved to be high watermarks in the first wave of British jazz-funk. Keyboardist Max Middleton and guitarist Robert Ahwai collaborated to produce 1979’s Another Sleeper. Middleton had previously appeared on guitarist Jeff Beck’s landmark album Blow by Blow and later was a member of Hummingbird, the soul band formed by Beck’s vocalist and fellow guitarist Bobby Tench, and which Robert Ahwai also later joined. There’s a lovely, romantic L.A./West Coast sound – though with a uniquely British sensibility – about much of Another Sleeper’s music, particularly on the flowing grooves of Robert Ahwai’s upbeat Dance by the Light of the Moon and Max Middleton’s Partial Eclipse/Total Madness, where Fender Rhodes piano and lush string arrangements combine to wonderful effect. Another Sleeper is partnered by Cape Wrath, the second album from Morrissey-Mullen, which became one of the UK’s most successful jazz-funk groups of the 1980s. Cape Wrath was also recorded for EMI’s Harvest imprint and featured many of the musicians who’d appeared on Another Sleeper, including Max Middleton and Robert Ahwai, which helped to give a pleasing consistency of ‘feel’ and style across both albums. Alongside original compositions from tenor saxophonist Dick Morrissey (Return to Tooting Broadway) and guitarist Jim Mullen (Cape Wrath and Night Song), soul and jazz evergreens such as Bill Withers’ Lovely Day and Mal Waldron’s Soul Eyes are given heartfelt jazz-funk arrangements. If it does nothing else, this release shows that, at its best, British jazz-funk was easily the equal of its American counterpart and indeed had an identity and sound of its own. Remastered from the original stereo master tapes. Remastered from the original stereo master tapes.

“Alan Clare contributes two stylish quartet numbers….The Courtley-Seymour big band rouses things with a lusty post-bop take on ‘Struttin’ with Some Barbecue’.”
(author unspecified), Jazzwise, May 2006

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CDLF 8140

This CD features three different works by three very different 20th century British composers, while two orchestras who have established strong links to the Dutton Epoch label – the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and the BBC Concert Orchestra – are on hand to interpret the scores with all their customary panache and virtuosity. The Scottish composer Erik Chisholm was one of those who, because he went to live abroad at a crucial phase in his career, have tended to be forgotten in the country of their birth. His Second Symphony (subtitled Ossian) dates from 1939 but was never performed as such. Instead it was quarried by the composer for his wartime ballet ‘The Earth-Shapers’ (‘a symphonic ballet in a prologue and one act’). It would be easy to relate this music to the times in which it was composed, as a metaphor for the struggle with Nazism. But Chisholm has left us no such allusion. In contrast, Trevor Hold’s song cycle, The Unreturning Spring, though written between 1961 and 1963 very much reflects issues of the war in setting the airman James Farrar’s poems. Eric Fogg, the son of the organist to the Hallé Orchestra, was a child prodigy composer whose youthful output was considerable. Known for his work as an accompanist for the BBC in Manchester during the ’20s/’30s and later as BBC Empire Director of Music in London, much of Fogg’s orchestral output is now lost. His evocative musical picture of the sea at dusk, Sea-Sheen, was published when Fogg was only seventeen. Eric Fogg’s orchestral evocation Merok is dated June 1929, and was published in 1934. Merok is a tiny village in Norway, situated at the head of the Geiranger Fjord, and Fogg’s musical picture takes the form of variations on a Norwegian folk song.

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The albums compiled on this CD represent the first LPs composer-arranger Johnny Keating made under his own name. Keating first attracted attention in the ’50s as the Ted Heath Orchestra’s arranger, a role he continued to fill – on and off – until the early 1970s. The albums presented here feature a sizeable contingent of Ted Heath sidemen as well as notable jazz names such as Jimmy Deuchar (trumpet), Tommy Whittle, Don Rendell (tenor saxes), Ronnie Verrell (drums) and Johnny Hawksworth (bass), among others. Under Keating’s direction they display their virtuosity in impeccably executed big band numbers including Keating originals (inc. Kiltie, Strictly for Kyx, Ultraviolet), Harry Roberts’s sublime trombone vehicle Quads Talk (feat. George Chisholm, Don Lusher, Keith Christie and Maurice Pratt) and originals by Jimmy Deuchar (Tam O’ Shanter, Clachnacudan Local) and pianist/vibes player Bill Le Sage (inc. Last Resort, Good Life).

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The superlative trumpet playing of Kenny Baker is one of the main attractions on this Vocalion release. On many of the tracks he leads The Jazz Today Unit, which on Operation Jam Session (1955) includes in its ranks special guests Joe Harriott, Bruce Turner and Bertie King (alto saxes). Produced by Denis Preston, side one of the original LP was taken up by an elongated medley of jazz standards including On the Alamo, What’s New? and Sweet and Lovely. Arranged by Kenny Baker, there is plenty of solo space for, among others, Jimmy Skidmore (tenor sax), Dill Jones (piano) and Keith Christie (trombone) as well as Kenny himself.

Tribute to Benny Carter (1955) is, as the title suggests, a tribute to the famous American alto saxophonist. With many of the same personnel as ‘Operation Jam Session’ (1955), it features The Jazz Today Unit as well as The Bertie King Jazz Group. The Jazz Today Unit perform Carter’s ten-minutes-plus Symphony in Riffs, while Bertie King’s Jazz Group swings its way through five Benny Carter compositions including Blues in My Heart, Skip It and Lazy Afternoon. Incidentally, both Bertie King and his sideman trombonist George Chisholm had appeared on the original 1937 Benny Carter recordings of Skip It and Lazy Afternoon.

The last four tracks are from a rare 1957 EP by the quintet of Australian-born violinist and composer Don Harper. Born in 1921, Harper arrived in the UK in 1955 and shortly afterwards began performing with his group at various London nightspots. In the 1960s and ’70s he was a heavily in-demand session musician, pioneering the use of electric violin and performing on countless TV and film scores as well as recording several albums under his own name. Introducing the Don Harper Quintet was his debut UK recording. It features a mix of standards (I May Be Wrong) with Harper originals (Just Rockin’), all showcasing the lithe improvisations and virtuosity of Don Harper.

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The best 1940s recordings of The Royal Air Force Dance Orchestra, better known as The Squadronaires, are compiled on this disc. Featuring contributions from soloists such as Jock Cummings (drums), George Chisholm (trombone), Andy McDevitt (clarinet) and Ronnie Aldrich (piano), the Squads swing their way through a selection of compositions by some of the biggest names in the big band business. These include Duke Ellington (C Jam Blues), Jerry Gray (A String of Pearls) George Williams (The Pogo Jump, A Mellow Kind of Mood), Sy Oliver (Double Jack, Nocturne, You Gotta Go) and Gene Krupa (Drummin’ Man). But there is much more also on offer here, making this a fine tribute to one of Britain ’s most important big bands of yesteryear.

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