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VERYAN WESTON with HANNAH MARSHALL and MARK SANDERS - Crossings

HI4HEAD Records CD HFHCD027

Hannah Marshall: cellist, improvisor and vocalist; Mark Sanders: drums; Veryan Weston: key station
Recorded January 2020 at Welwyn Garden City

A key station is a keyboard which essentially acts as a keying system, requiring a separate audio system to produce sounds - from a wide range, including for example drums, guitar, harpsichord, organ, percussion, piano and many others.  Veryan is reported to have first used it on a Henry Cow reunion set.

This music is a development from a number of ideas utilised at various performances during the last year to start up improvisation and now utilised as links and themes, each as a starting point.  The music is quite structured but is spoken in the language of improvisation.  Each musician seems to have a clearly defined role, but their interpretations of each composition rely heavily on their individual abilities as improvisors.  The musical themes are significantly varied, calling on such as tap dance rhythm, African sounds and moody, cinematic drama.  It’s quite enthralling, strictures of composition and the freedom of improvisation yielding between them an idiosyncratic knitwork of contemporary jazz.

Much of this is indicated by the development of each of these three musicians.  Hannah Marshall is very much experienced with other noted musicians in her field: Alison Blunt, Paul Dunmall, Ingrid Laubrock and Trevor Watts, while Mark Sanders calls upon an even broader tapestry which includes Derek Bailey, Charles Gayle, Henry Grimes, Evan Parker, Roscoe Mitchell, William Parker, Ivo Perelman, Roswell Rudd, Trevor Watts, Jah Wobble and John Zorn.

Hey, there’s a foundation for a very good collection of music if you’re just starting out or need to develop your existing!

Veryan Weston as well of course is broadly experienced in a multiple range of musical forms in the genres of free improv, jazz and rock – his works with Lol Coxhill, Phil Minton and Trevor Watts all spring to mind, Watts himself collaborating with Don Cherry, Steve Lacy and Archie Shepp.  Indeed, it seems like this venture may very well be rooted in the inspiration upon Weston engendered by Watts’ Moiré Music, back in the 1980s.

Sit back, relax and dream. 

Reviewed by Ken Cheetham

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ECM celebrates 50 years of music production with the Touchstones series of re-issues