Robert Glasper and John Surman help Manchester Jazz Fest hit 20 in style – plus exclusive Stuart McCallum track
Wednesday, July 22, 2015
The Manchester Jazz Festival celebrates 20 years of presenting new and invigorating jazz this year, when it runs from 31 July to 9 August, in what looks set to be its biggest ever programme with 78 gigs featuring 400 musicians, over 10 days and nights around the city.
While international names appearing this year include the Robert Glasper Trio, Norma Winstone (with Glauco Venier and Klaus Gesing) and John Surman with Strings, the festival continues to champion new music and emerging artists, particularly through its MJF Originals strand, which this year also includes ‘International’, ‘Introduces’ and ‘Afternoon Teas’ strands as well.
Glasper is set to headline the RNCM (8 August), Surman will perform at new festival venue the Reading Room at Central Library, while guitarist Stuart McCallum will launch his string-fuelled new album City – which you can hear an exclusive track from below – on a double bill with rising star singer/ violinist Alice Zawadzki, who will also perform with a string section (RNCM, 4 August). Other premieres will include ‘An Ape’s Progress’, a new multi-media project from imaginative saxophonist Iain Ballamy, Irish poet/storyteller Mike Sweeney and cult comic illustrator and filmmaker Dave McKean (RNCM, 6 August).
The festival hub will once again be the Thwaites Festival Square & Pavillion in the city’s Albert Square, which will host headline performances from Partisans, GoGo Penguin, Riot Jazz and Baked A La Ska, while Efpi Records and Onze Heures Onze collectives unite to play small and large ensemble pieces before a performance from French group OXYD.
BBC Radio’s Jazz On 3 once again presents a special edition of BBC’s Introducing, which will feature four emerging bands – Nérija, Ashley Henry Trio Cameron Vale and Phaze Theory – will be hosted by Jazzwise writer and BBC broadcaster/DJ Kevin Le Gendre. There will be UK debuts from Cuban pianist Pepe Rivero’s Trio and Basque saxophonist Gorka Benitez, while emergent new UK jazz acts appearing include Yesa Sikyi, Taupe, Agua Pasa, James Girling Quintet, Kalakuta and Nick Conn Octet. Manchester’s magnificent Town Hall will be used as a festival venue for the first time and will see a performance of the MJF’s flagship ‘Originals’ commission scheme, which this year premieres Evolution: Seeds and Steams, an audio-visual work created by pianist/singer John Ellis and filmmaker Antony BarkworthKnight.
– Mike Flynn
For full listings go to www.manchesterjazz .com
Stuart McCallum is releasing his new album City out 28 August on Naim Jazz here’s an exclusive preview of the track ‘T-Onics’