Jazz breaking news: New Wave Cinema gets boxed up and Jazz On 3 goes to the movies
Monday, September 16, 2013
Jazz fans and film buffs are in for a treat as the latest edition in the critically acclaimed Jazz on Film series of boxed sets focuses on the rich audiovisual association between French New Wave film directors and US and French jazz giants, while BBC Radio Three’s Jazz On 3 joins forces with BBC 4’s Sound Of Cinema season with a special broadcast tonight of an improvised jazz score to three short silent movies.
The 5-CD box, entitled French New Wave (Jazz on Film Vol. 3) – Original remastered soundtrack Recordings 1957-62 (pictured), features the likes of Miles Davis, MJQ, Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, Martial Solal, Barney Wilen and Michel Legrand and has been compiled by Jazzwise writer Selwyn Harris, who also wrote the in-depth sleeve notes featured in the box set’s 60-page booklet, with editorial consultancy from fellow Jazzwise writer and broadcaster Brian Priestley. The high quality remastering has brought new life to music from such films as Louis Malle’s classic Ascenseur pour l'échafaud, Roger Vadim’s Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Eduoard Molinaro’s Des Femmes Disparaissent, Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless and Eduoard Molinaro’s noir-influenced thriller Un Témoin Dans La Ville that all featured an often-subversive jolt of jazz to soundtrack their stark cinematic visions. The box set is available now and distributed by Proper Note and released on the new Jazz on Film Records label – for more info go to www.jazzonfilmrecords.com
Tonight’s Jazz On 3 broadcast is part of the BBC’s Sound Of Cinema season and takes this relationship between film and improvised music even further with new music created while watching a selection of silent film shorts, freely improvised by a quartet (pictured left) featuring Alison Blunt (violin), Viv Corringham (vocals), John Bisset (guitar) and David Leahy (double bass). The films – synced with the resulting music – will be available to watch while the programme is on air, and then also after broadcast. The three silent films begin with a 1920s educational sci-fi film, Trip to the Planets, followed by two contemporary abstract films.
Listeners can tune hear the Jazz on 3 broadcast tonight from 11pm online here as well as on 90-93 FM and on DAB.
– Mike Flynn