Paul Dunmall Invites...

[James W]

I've just come back from seeing Paul Dunmall, who played tenor sax and saxello, John Etheridge who played guitar, Fred Baker on bass and Asaf Sirkis on drums at the Eastside Jazz Club in the Birmingham Conservatoire. It was awesome! The overall sort of vibe reminded me of late-60s early 70s Miles in that each song segued into the next spontaneously, and there was lots of free playing which reached fantastic heights of abstraction. Dunmall is a powerful, adventurous player, unafraid of departing from the harmonic background laid down by John and Fred. I was unfamiliar with much of the repertoire they played - but then, perhaps so were they! But there was quite a bit of up-tempo stuff and John managed to keep up with Paul, often echoing him, it was quite thrilling. Rhythmically it was often free and Asaf Sirkis played some very nice colouristic stuff. Then, out of the blue, they started playing Mr PC! That was unexpected, and great. Then after some more free? playing they launched into their final number, 'It's About That Time' by Miles Davis, and it was just sick. Also there were vibes of late 60s John McLaughlin with Etheridge's playing and late Coltrane in Dunmall's playing. Basically, a lot of my favourite music. I got to express how great it was to Paul afterwards which was nice - I mentioned about Mr PC and he said he too wasn't expecting that, so I guess the gig really was improvised. Plus I bought a couple of CDs for a fiver each featuring some of the players of this gig, and made a friend whom I hope to see at the next 'Paul Dunmall invites' gig in November, where he'll be playing with a different ensemble. Also props to the student support group, whose rendition of Wayne Shorter's 'Deluge' I appreciated.

[James W]

I've just got back home from seeing Paul Dunmall on tenor sax, Liam Noble on piano, John Edwards on bass and Mark Sanders on drums, in the same place as last time. Another wonderful gig! (Yes, no guitar this time, but I still feel like I want to comment.) This one was by comparison with last time more pure free jazz, and it was very intense. Taking advantage of the all-acoustic set up this time I felt everyone explored the colouristic potential of their instrument; the drummer had an impressive array of sticks and mallets, and wasn't averse to using unconventional parts of his kit to yield strange sonorities, and also at times used his hands, as well as scratching the skins and making fine use of a small gong. Likewise the bassist often played very rhythmically and aggressively, treating his bass in a manner I'd more associate with a flamenco guitarist, lots of heavy chords were strummed, with rhythmical taps, clacks and smacks against the body of the instrument, along with etheral use of the bow and some nice harmonics. Even the pianist took to extended playing techniques, playing inside the piano, plucking its strings at one point. And Dunmall himself was wonderful, he got into many passages that were sheer eargasm for me - I guess you could describe it as sheets of sound, though he didn't over do it - always one was left feeling as though he was as interested in playing as a band and hearing and reacting to what was going on around him, but when it was necessary, he did play some blazingly fast passages. It's always interesting to hear how free jazz turns out, and I did ponder on its organisation and the rhythms, which suggested a general tempo often, and it seemed to me that the boundaries here between playing 'in time' and out were quite porous - but that goes without saying I guess. I thought it was very successful owing to its freeness. Anyway, it was recorded too so I hope it gets released (I asked Paul Dunmall afterwards about that but he didn't appear to be sure, but I told him I hoped it would be!) At times his tone was somewhat akin to that particular sort of melancholy one finds on Coltrane's Expression and Stellar Regions albums, though over all the group definitely has its own thing, and generally eschews themes, unlike those late Coltrane records. As for the student opening act, I enjoyed their renditions of 'Windows' by Chick Corea and 'Embraceable You'. What was also nice was that there was hardly an empty seat in the club - it's not a big club, but it was nice that so many people wanted to come for some intense, noisy and at times challenging free jazz, especially, I think, given that some people round here will dismiss even more mainstream forms of jazz as made by people stuck in their bedroom or something...

[James W]

Here, some of it has been uploaded! -

[Christian Miller]

Actually going to hear alive musicians playing live music is against JGO policy. The correct behaviour is to listen exclusively to old Blue Note records and complain either that

1) everyone plays like they did in the 50s and haven’t innovated at all
or
2) don’t play as good as they did in the 50s and that all modern music is noise

or both!

[grahambop]

There seem to be plenty of jazz gigs going on here in the south-east UK at the moment. I regularly go to gigs in Brighton (the Verdict) and Dorking (the Watermill). Trumpeter Chris Coull has been putting on interesting gigs at a church in Hove recently, I just saw Howard Alden there and before that, Chris and sax player Josephine Davies did a gig playing Coltrane stuff.

Other things I’ve seen recently at these venues include Kirk Lightsey, up-and-coming pianist Sultan Stevenson, Alina Hip Harp (very good jazz harpist, didn’t think it would be my cup of tea but actually she is great!).

Also there’s a club in Hastings we go to occasionally, saw Jerry Bergonzi there a while ago.

Next week I’m going to see trumpeter Henry Spencer with Ant Law on guitar, haven’t seen Ant before so should be interesting.

Someone has started a jazz club near where I live, and now they’ve started one in the next village too, so there must be some demand for it. They’ve had some well known UK players there, e.g. Simon Spillett, Ian Shaw, Nigel Price. In fact the gigs at this club usually sell out, I haven’t been much because I keep forgetting to book and then it’s too late!

[James W]

Just come back from another Paul Dunmall gig at the Eastside Jazz Club in Birmingham. Another wonderful gig! It's become more evident to me that Dunmall tends toward modal playing, though tempered, according to the types of players he's playing with, by a hefty dose of abstraction. But tonight the music ended up coalescing into playing that at least some of which was in time and given the repetition of motives and harmony, it creates essentially modal backdrops from which Dunmall and the other musicians base their improvisation (though that modal backdrop is itself of course improvised, and often morphs into something else). I guess it's still not 'playing tunes' but it feels like spontaneously 'playing tunes'. It was great though - the pianist, Glen Leach, who was excellent, had a penchant for playing inside the (acoustic) instrument, plucking and strumming strings and hitting it percussively and the bassist, Dave Kane likewise explored different timbres, at times using a bow, and the drummer, Tymek Jozwiak, also made use of tom-toms as well as sticks, or sometimes used just his hands, and at one point was hitting stuff with a tambourine. It's fascinating experiencing the band shift gears from more intense playing to more pointillist staccato and quieter stuff, and back again. And I enjoyed the student opening group, especially their rendition of the 'time-no-changes' tune 'Bop-Be' by Keith Jarrett and a version of Wayne Shorter's 'Infant Eyes' the melody of which was set to lyrics and sung. I also bought a couple of CDs of Dunmall's, though upon examining them, I discovered that one, Homage to John Coltrane, is meant to be a double album but only disk two is in it! I've messaged Paul, so hopefully it'll get sorted...

[StringNavigator]

Here, some of it has been uploaded! -

Thank you for sharing. I would never have known, otherwise.
Sounds like "I Left My Ear-Ache in Birmingham."
Glad you enjoyed it, though.
Regardless, I'll stick to my Old Man's Records...
Museum Jazz: Where melodic strains and decipherable rhythm remains.

However, I get loads of jazz from FM91 Radio, nearly most of it recognisable:
JAZZ.FM91 | Discover Music

Especially:
The Big Band Show with Glen Woodcock

::

[James W]

Thank you for sharing. I would never have known, otherwise.
Sounds like "I Left My Ear-Ache in Birmingham."
Glad you enjoyed it, though.
Regardless, I'll stick to my Old Man's Records...
Museum Jazz: Where melodic strains and decipherable rhythm remains.

However, I get loads of jazz from FM91 Radio, nearly most of it recognisable:
JAZZ.FM91 | Discover Music

Especially:
The Big Band Show with Glen Woodcock

::

This post is irrelevant to the thread. You're a troll.

[David B]

Ignore the moldy figs James. Keep the reviews coming! I enjoy following your journey discovering this music and the musicians who make it!

[James W]

Ignore the moldy figs James. Keep the reviews coming! I enjoy following your journey discovering this music and the musicians who make it!

Thank you, David! There is one more gig in this series on the 2nd of March before things seem to stop at the conservatoire for the exam period and then the summer. There are other events happening in and around Birmingham however, I'll keep my eyes peeled.

The funny thing is, is that, as I've stated and as you can hear on that video, Dunmall will start modally before taking things out (also modally) it's not like it's an abrasive exploration of timbre or non-traditional playing techniques (at least not for Dunmall himself, the most part) he actually tends towards the lyrical.

But figs gonna fig, I guess...

[James W]

I also bought a couple of CDs of Dunmall's, though upon examining them, I discovered that one, Homage to John Coltrane, is meant to be a double album but only disk two is in it! I've messaged Paul, so hopefully it'll get sorted...

Pleased to report that he sorted this. Not only that but I was able to buy his new album One Moment, a recording of the November 3rd gig at the Eastside Jazz Club Birmingham Conservatoire! (I suggested after that gig that he should release it).

I've not long got back home from seeing a quartet at the Eastside Jazz Club comprising Paul Dunmall on tenor sax, Tony Bianco on drums, Faith Brackenbury on violin and viola and John Pope on bass. Another smashing gig! Bianco's style I would describe as 'rollercoaster' drumming, in that it's quite continuous and gives the impression of undulating, overlapping waves, and this formed a kind of centre around which everyone else played. Among all the drummers I've heard with Dunmall, his style is closest to Rashied Ali. Brackenbury (who I think is Bianco's partner) was a really nice, refreshing part of this group, often engaging in a give-and-take with Dunmall, echoing him and vice versa and at times it sounded not unlike the heterophonic hollering of John Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders. I think this gig was more intense than the last one, and I found, pleasingly, the bass more audible than previous gigs in the this series. I really enjoyed the student support as well, which featured a fine guitarist and whose performance of Kenny Garrett's 'November 15' I enjoyed especially.

No more of these gigs until the autumn, alas...

[Litterick]

Back in the day

Elton Dean - alto sax, saxello
Paul Dunmall - tenor sax
Sophia Domancich - piano
Paul Rogers - bass
Tony Levin - drums

[reventlov]

Interesting posts, lots of players mentioned who I've not heard, and you've made me want to hear them.

John Etheridge on guitar however, I'm familiar with - he's an interesting and eclectic player - not many folks can say they've played with Soft Machine, with Stephan Grapelli, and last time I saw him, in a duo with the classical guitarist John Williams at Pizza Express in Soho. In addition, he performed with the bassist Ben Crosland, and appears on Crosland's album of jazz versions of songs by the Kinks - check out "The Ray Davies Songbook" if you don't know it, it's a fun listen.

Thanks for posting, good to see some enthusiasm

[James W]

Thank you for that, Litterick!

Apparently the bassist last night wasn't John Pope but rather Ollie Brice. Here are three videos of last night for you lucky people!

[James W]

I've kept on going to these gigs because they're all awesome. I feel very lucky having someone like Dunmall local.

Here is a fifteen minute clip from last night's installment. Of course it is free jazz, but, in the hands of Dunmall and co. this doesn't preclude use of themes, lyricism, use of pitch centricity i.e tonality and modes, nor more typical straight-ahead rhythms and sometimes the band can sound funky, too. As you can hear in the last few minutes of this clip, the group spontaneously come up with something very Coltrane-esque to conclude c. 45 minutes of totally improvised music.

[James W]

Although yesterday afternoon's gig wasn't part of the Paul Dunmall Invites series, it was a Dunmall gig which was as usual wonderful, and I left feeling very happy not only for that reason but because Paul gave me this freebie:

[supersoul]

I saw Paul Dunmall maybe 20 years ago when he played in Baltimore. He played tenor and bagpipes. He was great then, and it's cool you've been getting to check him out regularily now. I enjoy your gig reports.

[James W]

I saw Paul Dunmall maybe 20 years ago when he played in Baltimore. He played tenor and bagpipes. He was great then, and it's cool you've been getting to check him out regularily now. I enjoy your gig reports.

Thanks!