Alexander Hawkins

Yep. Set with Robert Mitchell, then (I think) an improv free-for-all. Dom's on it, too! 2pm. Then I'll park the contraption somewhere and we'll have "NUFF" jokes; and then in the evening get to the deep listening... Ah nice! I'll try to make it to an afternoon set too...I may have a commitment in the day so can't be sure, but I'll give you a bell...can't wait for the evening one though! BTW - for anyone in the London area on the fence - Maestro McPhee was on absolutely blazing form last night...do come down to catch us this evening if around!

No problem - hope to catch you soon!

Corey - you said it - only one thing on my mind on the Saturday - no, not playing! Are you playing during the day? Afraid nearest I'll be are the Wadada Leo Smith shows in Oxford..!

Yes - and I will introduce myself (lucky you!). Great!

Thank you all for the kind words about the album with Joe. It's a real honour to get to play with him, and indeed the other guys in that band...and I may have said it before, but it bears repeating: not only is he a wonderful player, but one of life's true nice guys. Mark - it'd be great to see you at those gigs! Do say hello! Steve - I suspect we may get to see the NYC guys in general a little more than vice-versa, but I completely take the point. I think the problem from our point of view is that the work visas are so prohibitively difficult to obtain...Recently, I can only think of Evan and John Butcher who've been over; them, plus there was a Vandermark/Lytton/Wachsmann tour a couple of years back, IIRC. As for Steve and John - I'm not sure...Canada may have been the closest they've been! I for one would love to make it over, but it's really hard! David - ah - too bad...hopefully soon though!

Have a few nice gigs coming up, so thought I would indulge in one of my periodic plugs...as ever, would be great to see anyone at a show... So this Friday, October 28th, in Novara, Italy - a duo with one of my heroes - the great Louis Moholo-Moholo. Very excited about this, and hopefully more news soon - we're in the studio tomorrow... On Saturday and Sunday (29th and 30th October), it's back to London, for a two-night residency at Cafe Oto: Decoy (Steve Noble, drums, percussion; John Edwards, and yours truly on Hammond B3) with maestro Joe McPhee. Here's some of what we got up to last time we played; the concert was released as this album. Here's a sound sample. The next week, the Convergence Quartet hits the road. This is a collective quartet comprising Harris Eisenstadt on the drums; Taylor Ho Bynum on the cornet; Dominic Lash on bass; and myself on piano - we all contribute compositions. Our last album was on Clean Feed, and we'll have copies in tow, although for anyone who caught the last tour, it'll be all new material this time around. The dates: 7/11: Dartington Hall 9/11: Churchill College, Cambridge 10/11: The Literary and Philosophical Society, Newcastle 11/11: Clothworkers' Centenary Hall, Leeds University 12/11: The Rising Sun Arts Centre, Reading 13/11: London Jazz Festival: Vortex Jazz Club In addition, at lunchtime on 10th November, Harris and I will be performing a duo concert at Newcastle University. On November 14th, I'm debuting a new group of mine: a quintet featuring Neil Charles, b; Otto Fischer, g; Shabaka Hutchings, tenor and bass clarinet; and Tom Skinner, d. This one is back at Cafe Oto. And on November 18th - do come down to the Southbank Centre, where I'll be guesting with Turkish firebrand Ilhan Ersahin at the London Jazz Festival's 'Nublu' show... Then at the end of the month, I'm taking part in a special event for the Oxford Improvisers Collective: on the 24th and 26th of November, we are welcoming Wadada Leo Smith to town...lineups tbc, but watch this space...

Although a version did exist in the 1960s, I'd argue they were really a band of the 1970s...the first record was 1971, off the top of my head... Now the Blue Notes...

1968 was a pretty extraordinary year...giving us both 'Machine Gun' and 'Karyobin'. I think an important record in any survey might also turn out to be Lacy's 'The Forest and The Zoo'...

Yes! Particularly like the arrangement...simple, and really swinging...

Also 3 great versions of 'Carefree' on the Art Ensemble box...great tune!

Some nice Al and Zoot!

Just to add - obviously no reason needed beyond Von to pick up 'Have No Fear', but just wanted to chip in that I absolutely LOVE the rhythm section playing on the record...John Young is spectacular...

My pleasure...he's heavy, to say the least!!!

Jim - as a tenor player, you've checked out Getatchew Merkurya, right? If not...watch out!!! (So much to say as well - was that other clip Ethiopian? Wonderful stuff!) Edit to say: mea culpa - it's Thai! (I watched the video embedded rather than following the link)...normally, saving face would dictate that I delete my Ethiopia remark just above, but I thought it was more interesting that one could be so far out geographically, whilst retaining musical similarities...I'm fairly confident in pointing up the similarities, just because I play a lot of Ethiopian music, so am pretty sure my ears aren't playing tricks!

Le Baiser Sale right next door to Sunside/Sunset; also, for more 'out' stuff, check Les Instants Chavires. Depending on when you're going, the great Jazz A La Villette festival may still be on. I played there on Thursday, and just got back: there's some great stuff coming up, and the venue - Parc de La Villette - is absolutely spectacular.

Really kind - thank you Bev! A charming interview with Mr. Hawkins (I assume done via email or questionnaire): Traveling Light Thank you! Indeed, it was an email questionnaire. By the way - to anyone with a even passing interest who hasn't seen it before - do check out Point of Departure: IMHO there's always some really deeply informed, interesting writing in this journal

Really kind - thank you Bev!

Thank you for the orders - another trip to the post office in the morning, for anyone else who would like a copy. There's also a review in the July Jazzwise, for the curious!

Great - glad it got there in good time! Just to say to anyone else curious - I'm travelling for some gigs in Europe this weekend, so afraid next trip to post office will be Tuesday for any dispatches!

Just made another trip to the post office - many thanks!

Ah yes! This one, but also this one! I haven't actually heard this latter record yet, but am looking forward to doing so!

Made it down to the post office today, so all copies ordered to this point are on their way!

Dear all, I'm really pleased to say that I now have copies of my new Ensemble album, 'All There, Ever Out'...it's essentially the same line-up as our previous effort: Javier Carmona, drums Otto Fischer, guitar Dominic Lash, double bass Hannah Marshall, 'cello Orphy Robinson, marimba yours truly, piano, compositions ...the only differences being that on one track, I play Hammond B3; on a further track, we are joined by Kit Downes on Hammond; and that Orphy Robinson plays marimba here, rather than steel pans (purely a quirk of my programming choices - he played some lovely pans on the session - the tracks just didn't 'sit' in the sequence!). As it's hot off the press, I'm afraid I can't tempt with any juicy quotes yet(!), but if you liked the first one, I hope you may even like this one more - I'm really delighted with how it turned out, and I feel the band identity comes through even stronger this time around...in the meantime, here are two tasters if you'd like to listen: Ahab and Tatum Totem III If anyone is interested in a copy, I have some I can sell at £10+pp. Thanks for weathering the sales pitch... p.s. I still have a small number of copies of the first album left too, so for interested parties, could do these on their own at £8+pp, or both for £18, to include pp.

I enjoy Amina Claudine Myers on that one track from Threadgill's 'Song Out Of My Trees' (a favourite Threadgill album for me...) - although it does sound to me like it might be an electric harpsichord...

If anyone's interested, I contributed to a piece on BBC Radio 3's Jazz on 3 last night about Stravinsky's influence on jazz...you can listen again here! Two pieces I've been listening to a lot recently - Apollon Musagete, which I hadn't heard in years, and one I have to confess was new to me - Persephone...the second movement of the latter in particular is amazing!