The Last Fandango

[Serial_Apologist]

I thought this should probably go here, rather than the Experimental, Jazz-Rock etc thread, as this is almost as sure as sure can be the last recording of Barbara Thompson featuring herself with her own band of 40 years' existence, Paraphernalia, and it's just out now. The title is the one I've used to head this thread:

http://www.temple-music.com/new-album-from-barbara-thompsons-paraphernalia/

Having given it one listen I would say that is probably as "arranged" as anything Barbara has done, with quite a bit of post-production.

Jon Hiseman ("Mr Barbara Thompson") informs me that he intends re-recording the pioneering 1966 album he recorded alongside pianist and leader Peter Lemer for Stollman's ESP label in NY, just prior to Lemer's visit there at Paul Bley's invitation, where he got to jam with some local musicians in one of the downtown clubs. Bley's conceptual influence was already strong, and the wild spirit bursting forth from the performance, with a very young John Surman alongside Nisar Ahmed ("George") Khan in the front line, and Hiseman's teenage years-associated Tony Reeves (later to join Colosseum) on bass, is strongly conveyed, notwithstanding the piss-poor recording quality of the original. Jon has long wanted to re-do the session, and intends getting the original line-up together to do it - which would be an achievement in itself!

Barbara is insistent that while the progress of the Parkinson's with which she was diagnosed back in 1997 has led to the situation of her having had to retire from playing, this is by no means the end of her story, since the successive rounds of innovative treatment, many of them only just out of the lab, that have held back the condition's progress, together with the love and support of friends and creative associates, especially from Jon, have allowed her to carry on with teaching and diversifying into the other genres that have kept her busy with score paper, showing a grasp of many of the essentials of modern composition in the concert music field, in which she has collaborated with a growing number of leading lights, including the Apollo Saxophone Quartet, percussionist Evelyn Glenny, and the Medici String Quartet. There's a concerto for orchestra in the pipeline - or rather Barbara's computer; it only had two bars left to be completed a fortnight ago, and even in mock-up it sounded amazing!

[Old Grumpy]

Thanks for this S-A. I have the very greatest respect for BT and her music.
I have put in an order for this disc.

OG

[Ian Thumwood]

S-A

Strangely enough I saw a review of this new record and was intrigued enough to have a read and then plough through some samples of Barbara Thompson's recorded history. In the circumstances, I think what she has achieved is amazing.

As far as Paraphernalia are concerned, I can remember their earlier records getting a lot of air play on Humphrey Lyttelton when I was getting in to jazz as a teenager. The band was considered really old-fashioned when I started to explore contemporary jazz as anything related to Jazz-Rock was considered a bit naff at the time. This was the time of the New- Neo's, ECM's heyday and the emergence of a new generation if jazz musicians who could see beyond trying to ape Miles' second quintet. It always felt that Jazz-rock got caught out trying to jump on the bandwagon of progressive rock and then found it had backed the wrong horse as jazz reinvigorated itself. Jazz-rock seemed to be marooned in the past by 1985. Listening back, their music seems sophisticated and there is a genuine musical intelligence about the music that was written. However, the synthesizer sounds and the plodding rock feel makes the records sound dated. I used to love a track called "Extreme Junction" which she wrote and, at the time, there was no question that the music had an appeal yet listening again, the music is very much akin to the likes of Bill Bruford's Earthworks or even some of Wayne Shorter's tepid 1980's records. I can appreciate why BT is held in such affection and see why the music her band produced would have a sizeable, dedicated following as it had am ambition well beyond a lot of the vacuous fusion of the time. Jazz has moved on considerably since the 70's and 80's and this style of jazz has long since ceased to be in vogue yet I suppose the intelligence within her writing means it retains an interest.