Acoustic Triangle - Grand Designs
Thursday, May 29, 2008
A rave in the nave could hardly be further from the idea behind Acoustic Triangle, that most cerebral of chamber jazz trios comprised of bassist Malcolm Creese, pianist Gwilym Simcock and saxophonist Tim Garland. Touring in sacred spaces, often the largest cathedrals and churches in the land, surprising audiences with sound coming from different angles around the historic spaces, has introduced an element often taken for granted in jazz performance: the nature and impact of space and environment. Acoustic Triangle talks to Stuart Nicholson about the sacred and the secular, working with a string quartet, the evolution of the group and how, above all, size matters, as the trio sets off for another extensive tour.
On the eve of an extensive tour of the UK with his group Acoustic Triangle augmented by the Sacconi Strings, leader Malcolm Creese, is bursting to get started. “We have invented a three dimensional performance,” he says with enthusiasm. “It’s very unlike American music and it’s got its own identity, this is what we think. Along with lots of others we’re creating something which is incorporating a lot of European influences, and it’s a very interesting development. It’s been suggested to me that Acoustic Triangle music doesn’t sound ‘American’. But when Americans hear it they are fascinated by it, they say, ‘we’ve never heard anything like this, it’s not what we hear’.”
Capable of producing music that is both sophisticated and sublime, Acoustic Triangle, comprising three of the UK’s finest musicians in Tim Garland on saxes and woodwind, Gwilym Simcock on piano and French horn and Creese on bass, have created unique distillation of jazz and classical spiced with a soupçon of folk. Determined their music should be heard acoustically, they turned to venues where historically music was performed without microphones, amplifiers and speakers – the religious spaces that comprise the UK’s network of churches and cathedrals.
It was an inspired move, culminating in their critically acclaimed 2005 tour of more than 30 dates in religious spaces around the UK. However, Creese is quick to point out that Acoustic Triangle is a secular undertaking, “We’re not doing this for religious reasons,” he says. “In fact we would be quite happy to do these performances in non-religious spaces, it’s not about religion, it’s about the spaces we play in, the architecture, the nature of the buildings; we’re quite happy to play in the Turbine Hall in Tate Modern. As long as the space is big and interesting.”
A work in progress since its formation seven years ago and with three critically acclaimed albums to their name, Acoustic Triangle are not one to rest on their laurels. “Although we started with smaller churches, we were asked to perform in a couple of cathedrals,” continues Creese. “The experience made us think it would be nice to tackle the challenge of playing in these big buildings. They are so huge and as we don’t use amplification people at the back might not get to see or hear very much.”
The result was a complete re-imagining and re-shaping of both the ensemble and its music to function effectively in the inspiring and often breathtaking surroundings of a cathedral. “I realised a long time ago was that you can’t just transport any music into any building and expect it to work,” Creese says, “and this has been fundamental to Acoustic Triangle for a number of years now. What we do is consider the space we’re going to perform in at every stage of the creative process, going right back to the composition stage, the rehearsal and improvising and choosing the tempos, the building is part of all those decisions, we always consider the building and if you want a successful performance you really need to
do that.
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