Reviews that mention Graham Collier
June 25, 2014
Luminosity-The Last Suites
Jazzcontinuum GCM 2014
Barry Guy New Orchestra
Amphi, Radio Rondo
Intakt CD 235
Danielle Palardy Roger
Le Caillou
Ambiances Magnetiques AM 215 CD
Modern Art Orchestra Plays the Music of Kristóf Bascó
Circular
BMC CD 204
Paal Nilssen-Love Large Unit
First Blow
PNL Records PNL 021
Something In The Air: Translating a Singular Vision to a Large Ensemble
By Ken Waxman
MORE
January 11, 2013
Rhapsody’s 2012 Jazz Critics' Poll
Individual Ballot
From Ken Waxman
• Your name and primary affiliation(s) (no more than two, please)
Ken Waxman
Jazz Word (www.jazzword.com); The New York City Jazz Record
• Your choices for 2012's ten best new releases listed in descending order one-through-ten.
1. François Houle Genera Songlines SGL 1595-2
2. Fred Ho/Quincy Saul The Music of Cal Massey: A Tribute Mutable/Big Red Media 004
3. William Parker Centering: Unreleased Early Recordings 1976–1987 NoBusiness Records NBCD 42-47 MORE
May 21, 2012
Relook: A Memorial 75th Birthday Celebration
Jazz Continuum No #
During an historic career in composed and improvised music that lasted more than 55 years, British bassist/educator Graham Collier (1937-2011) was familiar with, and arguably mastered, every type of jazz as a player and writer. Yet, as demonstrated by the 20 selections of this career retrospective, organized by Collier himself before his unexpected death, his greatest achievements were in the realm of modern, straight-ahead big band Jazz
As the tracks recorded from 1963 to 2004 on this two-CD set illustrate, Collier’s skill was second to none. But qualifiers have to be added about modern, straight-ahead big band Jazz. That`s because the ever-changing, non-atonal music which Collier dedicated his professional life to was increasing being compromised by Jazz’s neo-cons, whose rightful rejection of fads such as fusion and hip-hop, also led to a codification of what they consider “real Jazz”. The bassist’s writings in books and articles strongly argued against these retrogressive blinders and listeners will surely note how his own musical work put a lie to narrow classifications. MORE
January 26, 2010
The Jazz Composer: Moving Music off the Page
By Graham Collier
Northway Publications
Graham Collier
Directing 14 Jackson Pollocks
Jazz Continuum GCM 2009
One of the United Kingdom’s most accomplished jazz composers, arrangers and big band leaders, Graham Collier, who will be 72 in late February, has long crusaded against what he calls “grey music” – that is so-called jazz that lacks passion and excitement. This measured and well-researched volume is his most recent polemical volley in his on-going battle against mediocre big band jazz. Suffused with observations and experiences drawn from a lifetime in the jazz trenches, in many ways it’s his most personal and profound book. MORE
January 26, 2010
Directing 14 Jackson Pollocks
Jazz Continuum GCM 2009
The Jazz Composer: Moving Music off the Page
By Graham Collier
Northway Publications
One of the United Kingdom’s most accomplished jazz composers, arrangers and big band leaders, Graham Collier, who will be 72 in late February, has long crusaded against what he calls “grey music” – that is so-called jazz that lacks passion and excitement. This measured and well-researched volume is his most recent polemical volley in his on-going battle against mediocre big band jazz. Suffused with observations and experiences drawn from a lifetime in the jazz trenches, in many ways it’s his most personal and profound book. MORE
December 23, 2008
All Night Long
Ogun OGCD 029
Graham Collier
Deep Dark Blue Centre/ Portraits/The Alternate Mosaics
BGO CD 822
While most of the attention in Britain and overseas in the late 1960s, early 1970s was focused on progressive rock and pop music coming from England, far more notable sounds were being developed outside of the mainstream. Although the most far-reaching of these advances may turn out to be the non-idiomatic improv advanced by the likes of Derek Bailey and Evan Parker, two other strains deserve attention. MORE
December 23, 2008
Deep Dark Blue Centre/ Portraits/The Alternate Mosaics
BGO CD 822
Mike Osborne Trio
All Night Long
Ogun OGCD 029
While most of the attention in Britain and overseas in the late 1960s, early 1970s was focused on progressive rock and pop music coming from England, far more notable sounds were being developed outside of the mainstream. Although the most far-reaching of these advances may turn out to be the non-idiomatic improv advanced by the likes of Derek Bailey and Evan Parker, two other strains deserve attention.
One, represented here by Graham Collier’s session for septet and sextets, collected from three different LPs, expressed the depths of the composer-arranger’s art. Its variations on color, texture, space and voicing cemented Collier’s reputation in that tricky hyphenate’s top ranks. All Night Long on the other hand, is a free-for-all blowing session from three musicians who while fellow travellers, were not fundamental believers in Bailey-Parker-styled lower-case pure improv. MORE
October 17, 2005
Workpoints
Cuneiform Rune 213/214
More important for jazz in its day than Wynton Marsalis winning the Pulitzer prize for music, London-based bassist Graham Collier’s “Workpoints” was awarded the first-ever commission for jazz from the Arts Council of Great Britain in 1967.
WORKPOINTS, the CD, preserves a 1968 live version of the four-part suite plus two shorter numbers performed by a dozen of the United Kingdom’s best jazzers of the day. Coupled with it is LIVE IN MIDDLEHEIM, a Collier sextet date from more than seven years later. Featuring “Darius”, another of the bassist’s extended works and four other tracks, it’s looser and features guitar and the dreaded electric piano that are absent on “Workpoints”. MORE