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SOLO

© Bryony McIntyre: hamilton mausoleum, scotland 2006.


cds
Resonant Spaces | The Geometry of Sentiment | Horn_Bill | Cavern with Nightlife
Invisible Ear | Fixations (14) | London & Cologne | 13 Friendly Numbers

download: Huddersfield Prospects

read:
Bill Shoemaker's "Solo Flights" from Jazz Times.
Biba Kopf's's WIRE article on the "Resonant Spaces" tour.


I think I first played solo - a short piece, not a concert - in 1982 at the Workers' Music Association in Notting Hill Gate.
To quote from a 1998 essay the magazine Rubberneck requested:

"After a few concerts I'd learnt a lot about making connections - but had also noticed recognisable pieces beginning to develop. I quite liked this, but worried about what it meant for long-term solo work. For a while, I almost envied composers; able to wrap up a piece, send it out into the world, and move on to the next. But a lot of the pleasure in giving solo concerts is connected to the hope of finding, spontaneously, some music you didn’t really know about beforehand. Playing ‘pieces’ is too close to playing ‘routines’ and a concert is an opportunity for much more. As a live performer, improvising usually just feels better - less acting, less theatre, and more chance for a little magic. By way of a bonus, this means engaging with what Derek Bailey has described as a ‘search for whatever is endlessly variable’.

However, a considerable attraction of solo playing is that you have full control. You can work with material that may be too inflexible for the push and pull of group improvising; you can plan ahead, you can attempt pieces that have a definite, sustained, flavour - that adhere to some concept.”

Unblown Feedback-Tenor

feedback sax
© osamu enomoto - plan B, tokyo, japan 2004.
Whilst this is still close to my feelings about giving solo concerts - the other side of solo work has been to develop semi-compositional ideas for CD: from the 1992 multitracks on Thirteen Friendly Numbers to the 2002 microphone-based work on Invisible Ear.

This, in turn, has been re-introduced into concerts in the form of feedback-saxophone and close-miking.

Site-Specific Solos

john butcher stone museum concert photo
Oya Stone Museum, Japan                                                     ©osamu enomoto
In the last few years I have also had the opportunity to create solos specifically for large and unusual or especially characteristic acoustic spaces.
Two concerts/recordings have been made inside the giant Oya Stone Mountain in Utsunomiya, Japan.

Resonant Spaces was a 2006 tour in Scotland and the Orkneys organised by Arika. Butcher and Akio Suzuki visited sites specially chosen for their extraordinary acoustics.

Later that year I played, for Resonance FM, in Oberhausen's famous 200m gazometer.



Resonant Spaces

Location recordings from Scotland and the Orkney Islands (2006).

solo saxophone - acoustic and amplified/feedback

Sleeve notes by Biba Kopf and Barry Esson.

read: WIRE :: Dusted


The Geometry of Sentiment

john butcher solo cd
order CD via Emanem
Live recordings from Japan (2004) and Europe (2006).

solo saxophone - acoustic and amplified/feedback

Sleeve notes by Stuart Broomer.

read: all about jazz 1 :: all about jazz 2 :: Dusted


Horn_Bill

horn_bill cover
order CD via Matchless
One track (18:44) on this double CD on Matchless.
Contains of all of the solos played on 9th January 2005 at the 291 Gallery, Hackney.
The all reed concert was organised by ONGAKU:enjoy_sound.

John Butcher
Nathaniel Catchpole
Kai Fagaschinski
Lou Gare
Evan Parker
Seymour Wright


read: Bagatellen :: KFJC


Cavern with Nightlife

Two concerts, recorded in Japan in 2002. On Weight of Wax.
1st half: Solo inside the Oya Stone mountain.
2nd half: Duo with Toshimaru Nakimura (no-input mixing desk).


read: WIRE :: Dusted :: One Final Note :: All about Jazz (Italy)


13 Friendly Numbers

13 friendly numbers cover Saxophone solos and multitracks.
Recorded 1991 and originally released on ACTA.
2004 reissue on Unsounds.


read: Sunday Herald :: Paris Transatlantic :: Dusted :: MOJO :: Penguin guide to Jazz :: BBC


Invisible Ear

Reissue of the long out-of-print "fringes" 2003 limited issue.

Saxophones; acoustic, close-miked, amplified, feedbacking.
Solo and multitracked.

Sleeve notes by David Toop.



read: Musicworks :: Stylus :: Dusted :: Squid's Ear :: Paris Transatlantic


Fixations (14)

fixations cover
order CD via Emanem.
All live recordings 1997-2000.
On Emanem.

read: All Music Guide :: Jazz Times


London & Cologne

Concert recordings: 1994-1996 - plus one multitracked piece.

full info Rastascan

read All Music Guide


Huddersfield Prospects

feedback sax
download from 7HINGS.
7HINGS is a web site delivering exclusive recordings by download only.
In 2006 they commisoned a day of concerts at the Huddersfield New Music Festival.

Huddersfield Prospects consists of 4 solo (acoustic and feedback) pieces, plus a multi-track composition - Deposition 1 - created afterwards from the live material.





Feedback Saxophone:  photo © Bryony McIntyre / Arika.

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