Jazz orchestra joins line-up at Gateshead
Jazz orchestra joins line-up at Gateshead
The already impressive line-up for next year's Gateshead International Jazz Festival has been further enhanced by the addition of a brace of concerts by the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, teaming a matinee performance of the band's new Jazz Toons: Top Cats, Action Men and Incredible Super-Heroes programme with the Scottish Jazz Award-winning In the Spirit of Duke recital of Ellingtonia with pianist Brian Kellock.
Saxophonists Courtney Pine and Jean Toussaint and Mercury Prize nominees Polar Bear have also been added to the bill for the festival, which runs from April 4 to 6.
l sagegateshead.com
Noakes releases Rafferty rarities
Singer-songwriter Rab Noakes, above, has released a second CD of Demos & Rarities, this time focusing on his musical adventures with his late friend Gerry Rafferty.
Noakes, who first met Rafferty in Billy Connolly's dad's house in 1969 and went on to co-found Stealers Wheel with Rafferty, has compiled 19 tracks, including a 1971 recording of Stealers Wheel performing Rafferty's ode to his mother, Mary Skeffington. The collection ends with Noakes's solo vocal and guitar reading of Rafferty's Moonlight & Gold from the commemorative concert he directed for Celtic Connections in 2012.
l rabnoakes.com
Composer prize for Capperauld
Young composer Jay Capperauld, whose works Heroin Chic and Heroin Baby were singled out for praised by The Herald's Michael Tumelty when they were first performed at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, last week became the first winner of a new composition award in London.
It was an audience vote in the Jerwood Hall at LSO St Luke's that gave Dehumanised Shock Absorbers the victory and Capperauld the Heidi Cupp trophy. His piece now enters the repertoire of the Worker's Union Ensemble, whose "Call for Works" competition attracted 80 entries, of which a short-listed four were played at the concert.
l workersunionensemble.co.uk
McCreadie BBC contest hopeful
Fergus McCreadie, winner of the under-17 section of the Young Scottish Jazz Musician of the Year 2013 competition, is through to the next stage of BBC Young Musician 2014, the first time the competition has had a jazz category.
The 16-year-old pianist from Dollar, who has already been accepted for the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland's jazz degree course, will now appear at the UK-wide jazz auditions held at Hoddinott Hall, Cardiff on January 23 and 24.
l bbc.co.uk/youngmusician
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