Fish Tales @ The BBC

Happy New Year to everyone. Here’s the link to the broadcast of Fish Tales from the Herts Jazz Festival.  It’s available until about 22nd January on the BBC iPlayer.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09k6btg

Here’s a review from Jazz Rag of the performance at the festival:

One programmed concert of new music at many a festival these days is the latest suite by Alan Barnes, usually for an all-star octet. This year it’s Fish Tales, music and poems based on the Grimsby fishing industry. I often wonder how precisely thematically based jazz suites relate to their subject matter, but in this case the correspondence between the music and Josie Moon’s words is pretty close, from the rowdy fun of Three Day Millionaires to the street parade sounds of Homecoming, even Dave Green’s bubbling bass solo for The Drowning Man. Moon’s poetry covers the domestic, the documentary and the supernatural, her explanations are clear and her readings dramatic. Alan Barnes’ writing makes particular use of the versatility of his threeman reed section (some lovely writing for two clarinets and bass clarinet) and, with top-class soloists throughout the band, Mark Nightingale and Robert Fowler made a particularly strong impression.

Ron Simpson