Click here to view the embedded video.

Lloyd’s tone has never been better and the importance of his personal musical philosophy is clear.  Mirror features beautiful, transformed versions of favorites including both Lloyd originals and tunes he has made his own over the years.  There’s a pair of Thelonious Monk tunes, Ruby, My Dear and Monk’s Mood, as well as hymns and traditionals including Go Down Moses, Lift Every Voice and Sing and The Water is Wide.  Lloyd covers Brian Wilson’s
Caroline, No and plays a haunting version of the the standard I Fall in Love Too Easily.   Lloyd originals include Desolation Sound, Mirror, Tagi (which includes a Bhagavad Gita inspired spoken-word meditation by Lloyd) and Being and Becoming.

It’s going to be one to watch.  UK release date is 27 September and you’ll be listening to tracks from Mirror on the 30 September show here on Cosmic Jazz.

Miles Davis and his longtime producer Teo Macero were responsible for this.  The changes were so dramatic that musicians present at the recordings didn’t recognise the music when it was released.  Bitches Brew contains 15 edits, with several short tape loops of just five seconds (at 3:01, 3:07 and 3:12) and so this revolutionary work was not only a controversial classic of musical innovation, it also became renowned for its pioneering use of the studio as an instrument in its own right.

We also featured new music from Mercury Prize nominee Kit Downes, remembered the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina with a track from Terence Blanchard’s A Tale of God’s Will project and paid a final tribute to trumpeter Harry Beckett with a piece from Mike Westbrook’s atmospheric Metropolis suite.

1. Kairos 4tet – Hymn to Her
2. Lonnie Liston Smith – Astral Travelling
3. Kit Downes Trio – Golden
4. Roy Ayers – Daddy Bug
5. Herbie Hancock – The Song Goes On/Ostinato (Suite for Angela)
6. Mike Westbrook – Metropolis IX
7. Miles Davis – Bitches Brew
8. Sleep Walker – Into the Sun (feat. Bembe Segue)
9. Terence Blanchard – Levees

Video this week is an interview with Kit Downes in which he talks about his first jazz record, Oscar Peterson’s Night Train.  We’ve followed this with the classic Peterson Trio playing You Look Good To Me.  Enjoy!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

1. Marc Cary Trio – Bismillah Khan
2. The Brian Lynch/Eddie Palmieri Project – Free Hands
3. Terry Callier – Keep Your Heart Right
4. Max Roach – Triptych:Prayer/Protest/Peace (feat. Abbey Lincoln)
5. Booker Little – Bee Tee’s Minor Plea
6. Gerardo Frisina – Waltz for Emily
7. Phronesis – Eight Hours
8. Sound Advice – La Giostra (the Roundabout)
9. Miles Davis – Sanctuary
10. Steve Dyer – Qinisa Indlu
11. Stan Getz and Kenny Barron – I Remember Clifford
12. Gary Bartz Ntu Troop – Sifa Zote
13. Charles Lloyd – Booker’s Garden

If you’ve been to see jazz locally, write and tell us about it via the Comment facility below this list of venues and events.

Fleece Jazz at Stoke by Nayland Club
03 September – Lush Life feat. Roger Beaujolais and B J Cole
Website: http://www.fleecejazz.co.uk
Phone: 01787 211865

Ipswich Jazz Club
12 September – Karen Sharp Quartet
Website: http://www.ipswichjazzclub.co.uk
Phone: 01473 231552

Jazz Nights at the Bell
05 September – Art Themen
Website: http://www.jazz-nights.com
Phone: 01223 362550

Milestones Jazz Club, Lowestoft
05 September – Michael Garrick and Nette Robinson (Remembered Time)
Website: http://www.milestonesjazzclub.co.uk/
Phone: 01502 568684

The Devil’s Kitchen Collective, Bury St Edmunds
04 September – Myke Clifford’s Hambone
Website: not yet available
Phone: 07917 860384

Segue Productions @ Lakeside Theatre, Colchester
no jazz events currently programmed
Website: http://www.segue.org.uk/
Phone: 01206 825600

Colchester Arts Centre
no jazz events currently programmed
Website: http://www.colchesterartscentre.com
Phone: 01206 500900

Cambridge Modern Jazz Club
24 September – John Etheridge Quartet
Website: http://www.cambridgejazz.org
Phone: 01223 362550

There was also Pharaoh’s Dance, another long track from the seminal Bitches Brew, recorded 40 years ago this month.  In the liner notes to the album critic Ralph J Gleason wrote that “right now it the on the edge of newness and has that snapping fire you sense when you go out there from the spaceship where nobody has ever gone before.”

Sounds rather like Cosmic Jazz to me…

1. Joshua Redman – I’m an Old Cowhand
2. Sound Advice – Jungle Juice
3. Harry Beckett – Tender is the Sky
4. Michael Garrick – Fellow Feeling
5. Terence Blanchard – Harvesting Dance
6. Erik Truffaz and Murcof – Al Mediodia
7. Miles Davis – Pharaoh’s Dance
8. Colin Steele – Lament for Miles
9. Harry Beckett – Something Special
10. Abbey Lincoln – The Music is the Magic
11. The Brian Lynch/Eddie Palmieri Project – Free Hands
12. Phronesis – Eight Hours

Videclips this week just had to be from both Abbey Lincoln and Harry Beckett.  The music speaks for itself:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

New to Cosmic Jazz is a series of short artist profiles which will give some essential biographical detail along with key recordings to listen to. We start off with pianist Michael Garrick,who has been part of the British jazz scene since the arrival of his first recordings in 1959. Garrick is not just a pianist though: he’s a major composer and jazz educator, having held posts at the three major London music colleges in addition to holding his own jazz summer schools.

He’s recently published an autobiographical account of British jazz in the 1960s – Dusk Fire – Jazz in English Hands -and, rather belatedly, Garrick recieved the MBE in the 2010  New Year’s Honours list.

His work as pianist with the Don Rendell/Ian Carr Quintet between 1965-69 features some of his best playing but you also need to check out Garrick’s own large scale compositions. It is these which capture his essential English take on jazz. It’s the very fact that Garrick followed his English inspirations of church and folk musics rather than the American jazz tradition that has led to the creation of his most innovative work.

For a longer account of Garrick’s life and influences check out Dennis Harrison’s excellent article on the Jazzscript website.

Selected recordings:
Don Rendall/Ian Carr Quintet – Dusk Fire (1965)
Michael Garrick – Black Marigolds (1966)
Michael Garrick – Jazz Praises at St Paul’s (1968)
Michael Garrick – Troppo (1973)
Michael Garrick – Green and Pleasant Land (2002)
Michael Garrick – Big Band Harriot (2004)

To hear Michael Garrick live in East Anglia, just head straight for Milestones Jazz Club in Lowestoft where he will be playing with Nette Robinson on 05 September.

We played music from some of the key piano trios of the last 30 years – from the influential Chick Corea’s Blue Note masterpiece of 1968 (Now He Sings, Now He Sobs) to last month’s release from bassist Jasper Hoiby. In between we featured Bill Evans, EST, Keith Jarrett, Brad Mehldau and more.

1. Chick Corea – Windows
2. Duke Ellington, Charlie Mingus and Max Roach – Fleurette Africaine
3. Oscar Peterson Trio – Corcovado (Quiet Night of Quiet Stars)
4. Bill Evans Trio – Milestones (live)
5. Bill Evans Trio – Introduction/One for Helen (live)
6. Michel Camilo Trio – Nardis
7. Michel Petrucciani Trio – Here’s That Rainy Day
8. The Bad Plus – Smells Like Teen Spirit
9. Brad Mehldau – River Man
10. Keith Jarrett Trio – Autumn Leaves/Up For It (live)
11. EST – Tuesday Wonderland (live)
12. Robert Glasper Trio – No Worries
13. Robert Mitchell Trio – Teardrop
14. Phronesis – Blue Inspiration

The Brecon Jazz Festival earlier this month featured an excellent lineup – with Phronesis, Nostalgia 77, Kairos 4tet, the Kit Downes Trio and the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble – all artists we’ve featured here on Cosmic Jazz.

But let’s start with our own Snape Summer Prom season this year which featured Django Bates’ Beloved Bird project on 06 August and continues with Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Orchestra on 10 August and the Neil Cowley Trio on 17 August.  Courtney Pine brings his Transition in Tradition band to Snape on 24 August and pianist Alex Wilson curates the Big Latin Weekend on the Bank Holiday weekend of 28-29 August.

Ronnie Scott’s BritJazz Fest continues through into August with the Colin Towns Mask Orchestra and the Denys Baptiste Quartet on 13 and Talvin Singh and the Cleveland Watkiss Quartet on 14 August – again, all artists who have featured on Cosmic Jazz over the last year.

Next month sees the start of the Scarborough Jazz Festival with a slew of artists who have featured here in the East of England – Nigel Price, Stan Tracey and Karen Sharp.

Finally, the 2010 London Jazz Festival kicks off on 12 November, with Herbie Hancock playing on 13 and 14 November. Other headliners include the Bad Plus, Hugh Masakela, Brad Mehldau, John Scofield, Gary Burton, Palle Mikkelborg and Marilyn Mazur. And yes, of course, we’ve featured all of these artists here on the show. Lots more details and a festival brochure can be found at on the website.

We mixed tracks and played some edited versions to cram in as much great music as we could.  Technical gremins tonight very briefly silenced the music – but treat those brief silences as extracts from John Cage’s seminal 4.33 and you’ll be fine…  Enjoy!

1. DJ Shadow – Best Foot Forward/Building Steam with a Grain of Salt (alternative versions)
2. Terri Lynne Carrington – Jazz Is
3. Santana – Every Step of the Way
4. Bahia Black – Follow Me
5. Fela Ransome Kuti and Africa 70 – Ginger Baker and Tony Allen Drum Solo
6. Christian Prommer’s Drumlesson – Can You Feel It
7. Albert Ayler – In Heart Only (live)
8. Lew Tabackin Trio – The Best Thing for You
9. Charlie Parker – Bongo Bop
10. Sun Ra – Disco 3000
11. John Zorn – Giu la Testa! (Duck, You Sucker!)
12. The Cinematic Orchestra – All That You Give
13. Miles Davis – Feio
14. Bill Dixon with Exploding Star Orchestra – Entrances/Two
15. Duke Ellington – Sunset and the Mockingbird
16. Piero Umilliani – Caravan
17. Ken Nordine – Blue
18. Winston Mankunku Ngozi – Yakhal’ Inkomo
19. Vassilis Tsabroupoulos – Mystic
20. Don Byron – Belmondo’s Lip (DJ Spooky remix)

Tonight’s videoclips (yes, two!) are also suitably leftfield.  The first is from jazzpoet and voiceover supremo Ken Nordine while the second is Sun Ra’s version of Pink Elephants on Parade, synched to original footage from the Dumbo soundtrack.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Well – you were warned!

Normal service resumes next week as we feature a look at great contemporary jazz piano trios including Bill Evans, Keith Jarrett and Brad Mehldau.  We’ll also bring the art of the piano trio right up to date with some of our feted new artists – Kit Downes, Jasper Hoiby and others.

As always, let us know what you think via the Comments section of the site.  For more information about Lester Bowie’s Rios Negros, go to the Features section of the site and scroll down.

1. Geoff Eales Trio – Magister Ludi
2. Kairos 4tet – VC
3. Matthew Halsall – On the Other Side of the World
4. Mauricio Maestro (feat. Nana Vasconcelos) – Verdade Anterior
5. Azymuth – Caca a Raposa
6. The Detroit Experiment – Think Twice
7. Edgaro el Productor en Jefe – Mami (Tropicalia remix)
8. Miles Davis – John McLaughlin
9. Ella Fitzgerald – With a Song in My Heart
10. Dave Holland and Pepe Habichuela – The Whirling Dervish
11. Willis Jackson – Nuther’n like Thuther’n/Jimmy Smith – Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (pt. 2)
12. Lester Bowie – Rios Negros
13. Aaron Parks – Nemesis
14. Hypnotic Brass Ensemble – Jupiter
15. Herbie Hancock – Wiggle Waggle

This week’s videoclip comes from Ella Fitzgerald – it’s her swinging version of Jobim’s Desafinado.

Click here to view the embedded video.