Pei Anne digs deep (Picture: Garry Corbett)

Adrian Boult Hall, Birmingham UK
10-03-10
It’s always a treat when Dave Holland’s in town. The Wolverhampton-born, US-resident double bass legend and one of the finest band leaders and composers in the business, has been visiting Birmingham Conservatoire regularly over the past few years as artist-in-residence.

He had spent this week working with two groups hand-picked from jazz course students and for this concert they were playing tunes from the pen of Dave. It was a truly wonderful evening of outstanding music exceptionally well played.

If Ensemble 2 – Tim Thornton on bass, Chris Draper on drums, Matt Ratfcliffe on piano, Steffan Ciccotti on vibes, Pei Anne on violin, Rachel Cohen on alto and Nick Rundle on tenor and bass clarinet – benefited from more experience, more confidence and band cohesion, Ensemble 1 – Daniel Casimir on bass, Euan Palmer on drums, Toby Boalch on piano, Joe Howell on guitar, Ben Goodhall and Alex Woods on saxophones, and Kieron Macintosh on trumpet – still put in a damned fine performance.

Throughout both halves there was texture, there was a range of moods, there were well-honed solos, there were strong ensemble passages, there were risks taken and disasters avoided. It was also a pleasure to hear fairly regular acoustic line-ups playing fairly regular jazz compositions and be reminded that there is still so much potential in this music we call jazz.

It’s heart-swelling stuff, and I don’t just say that because these are students and deserve the loudest and longest of applause. Their energy, determination, seriousness of purpose, and the glorious sounds they make have a really profound effect – they remind us how fortunate we are to be living in a city in the middle of England that just happens to have an educational institution at its centre which is manned by dedicated teachers (and practitioners themselves) of vision who attract some of the most talented young jazz students in the land, and that we get to enjoy the fruits of their labours.

Of course, it was great to hear the master give us a little solo piece at the end of the evening, but I think his compositions and the inspiration they had given to the students, all of whom really did play out of their skins, had rewarded me sufficiently already.

Those shrewd lasso-wielding Harmonic Festival men had cleverly rustled this gig in to their line-up and billed it as the festival’s launch; spin doctors would be proud of them. Harmonic, in fact, kicks off properly tomorrow evening at the Yardbird. Read my interview with them here and check out the rest of Harmonic’s line-up here

Oh, and do check out hollandforaweek.com – the online home of video-diaries contributed by Dave, the staff and students involved in Dave Holland Presents…