To coin a cliché, it’s good stuff and sounds great! (Hoffmen ™) The construction is a coat of many colours, melodic passages, repeating themes, modal breakouts which underscore solo improvisation floating on air, and artists allowed out of the rhythm section pen for a brief bass or drum solo. Despite its origin in the political/social cauldron of 1967 it is not the voice of “protest” left to folksingers, it is a celebration of music, with an occasional digression into the meme of conflict – Westbrook’s pieces often make reference to “war” by way of a musical metaphor, an instrument-battlefield, cacophony. The solo voices are the cream of British jazz instrumentalists of the late Sixties – John Surman, Mike Osborne, Malcolm Griffiths, Dave Holdsworth. It is somewhere between Gil Evans and George Russell, with a touch of Mingus, and a smidgin of Ellington and (runs out of reference points) and. It is not a swing-band, or a big-band power-outing, or a stimulus-package ensemble with three of everything. Trust The Tracking-Force, Luke.īass player Harry Miller: native of Capetown, South Africa, joined Manfred Mann, played in Brotherhood of Breath, was a member of Keith Tippett’s big band Centipede, co-founded Ogun Records, moved eventually to Holland, where he sadly died in a car accident in 1983.Ĭelebration jazz orchestra composition, melodies, modes and tempo dictated by Westbrook and Surman, but with ample freedom in the solo passages. Westbrook looks like the odd man out with a jazz concert band, an acoustic 12-tet, no 300-watt Marshal stacks or amplified instruments. Producer/ engineer Eddie Kramer lists on his credits Jimi Hendrix Are You Experienced, Axis Bold As Love and Electric Ladyland, Traffic’s Mr Fantasy, then goes on to add Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, and just about everyone in the the British Rock Hall of Fame. Mike Osborne, alto saxophone Bernie Living, alto saxophone, flute John Surman, baritone saxophone, soprano saxophone, bass clarinet Harry Miller, bass Tom Bennelick, french horn Mike Westbrook, piano Dave Chambers, tenor saxophone, Clarinet Malcolm Griffiths, trombone Dave Holdsworth, trumpet, flugelhorn George Smith, tuba Dave Perrottet, valve trombone Alan Jackson, drums recorded 29th July and 5th August 1967, John Surman/ Mike Westbrook, compositions Eddie Kramer, producer and engineer, Graham Keen, photography Alan Jackson, cover design liner notes, the notable jazz writer and experimental jazz promoter, Victor Schonfield (sadly passed away May 2022) Selection: Pastoral – Awakening (Westbrook/ Surman) 13:12 įirst two tracks merge together, lacking a track-break, so the selection is both Pastoral and Awakening.

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