Ingrid Laubrock - Stolen Moments
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock has within a short period of time become part of the progressive adventurous stream of jazz coming out of the London scene centred around the F-IRE Collective. With her new group she this month debuts new album Sleepthief in the company of forward-thinking American drummer Tom Rainey and pianist Liam Noble. Duncan Heining talks to Ingrid about her fast-developing career and how she sees the direction of her music in a rapidly changing musical landscape.
The British jazz community has always welcomed settlers from overseas. Musicians from the Caribbean like Joe Harriott, Dizzy Reece, Shake Keane and Coleridge Goode enriched our music in the fifties and sixties, as did Canadians Kenny Wheeler and Ray Warleigh. In the mid-1960s, the Blue Notes and other players from South Africa helped transform the scene. More backward Britons may not realise it but immigration stimulates and revitalises a society and makes it more open to new ideas and ways of being. Musicians know this instinctively.
German-born saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, like her compatriot and fellow émigré Hans Koller, may not represent a new diaspora but already their contributions to British Jazz stand tall alongside home-grown talents. Laubrock’s journey has been a patient one with each step building upon the one before. Like many other fine musicians, her playing reflects her personality – patient, studious but filled with quiet confidence and authority.
Her early career saw her working in a predominately mainstream, often Latin-influenced context, frequently in the company of Brazilian singer Monica Vasconcelos in the group Nois4. However, her new record Sleepthief sees her revelling in the world of European free improvisation in the company of pianist Liam Noble and American drummer Tom Rainey. Released this August on the prestigious Swiss Intakt label, it’s almost like a second debut for Ingrid.
When I saw her last year at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival, Ingrid was premiering a piece commissioned by the Jerwood Foundation. That work for a nonet featuring two pianos reflected both a growing interest in composition and an increasing enthusiasm for abstraction. I start by suggesting that she has moved a long way from her first two albums, Who Is It? and Some Times for Candid. It’s a point she accepts.
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