LONDON, MEMORIAL
SERVICE FOR JAZZ PIONEER, NEIL ARDLEY
Tuesday July 26th 2005 from 12 noon to 1.30 p.m.
St Paul’s Church (The Actor's Church), Bedford St, Covent Garden, London
WC2 9ED
A Memorial Service is to be held on Tuesday July 26th 2005 at the Actors
Church in London’s Covent Garden to celebrate the life and work of Neil
Ardley one of Britain's most innovative jazz musicians. All are welcome.
Neil Ardley died on February 23rd 2004 at the age of 66.
The service will include live performances from his acclaimed albums
'Kaleidoscope Of Rainbows' and 'Symphony Of Amaranths' by performers
including Barbara Thompson, Michael Garrick and Norma Winstone together with
Warren Greveson and John Walters from Ardley's last band, Zyklus.
About The Actors
Church http://www.actorschurch.org
St Paul’s Church is located in the busy West End of London and as well as
being the Parish Church of Covent Garden, it is also affectionately known as
"The Actors' Church" because of its long association with the
theatre community.
This church situated on the west side of the piazza built by Inigo Jones has
been in Covent Garden since 1633.
Samuel Pepys recorded the first ever mention of seeing bash-happy Mr. Punch
perform here in May 1662, describing him as “very pretty, the best that I
ever saw, and great resort of gallants”.
The very first victim of the Great Plague, Margaret Ponteous was buried in
the churchyard on April 12, 1665
About Neil Ardley
Neil Ardley is best remembered for his pioneering work with ‘jazz
orchestra’, notably the New Jazz Orchestra (NJO), whose first album,
‘Western Reunion’ (1965), opened the door to his distinctive sound, most
famously observed on his fabulous "Shades Of Blue".
That door was opened wider when Neil met independent producer Denis Preston
- ‘a rare Diaghilev-like figure’ as Neil observed.
Preston owned Lansdowne Studios in London and had been recording popular
jazz artists, such as Acker Bilk and Chris Barber, for the Record
Supervision and Lansdowne Series (recordings themselves being reissued for
the first time by specialists such as Lake Records).
Preston, a bridge between ‘trad’ jazz and an emerging rock variant,
warmed to Ardley and proved the cornerstone of a series of ground-breaking
album releases.
He offered his professional and financial support in future recording
ventures and under his wing Neil composed his first full-length works in a
style that combined classical methods of composition, with returning themes
in a framework that was European yet essentially English pastoral in
treatment.
As John L Walters wrote in a Guardian newspaper obituary for Neil: "He
had an idiosyncratic ear for orchestral colour, a classical composer's
ability to create long, through-composed pieces from a handful of motifs and
a jazz bandleader's ability to write for specific personalities. “The
Greek Variations’ (1969) - based on a folk tune - and ‘A Symphony Of
Amaranths’ (1971) - with settings of poems by Yeats, Joyce and Carroll,
and a version of Edward Lear's Dong With The Luminous Nose, recited by Ivor
Cutler - featured strings, orchestral woodwind and harp.
Key contributions came from the likes of trumpeter Ian Carr, drummer Jon
Hiseman, saxophonists Barbara Thomson, Dave Gelly and Don Rendell and
vibraphonist Frank Ricotti.
The two albums were part of a trilogy completed by ‘Kaleidoscope Of
Rainbows’ (1976), composed between 1973 and 1975 as a seven-part work for
jazz orchestra and performed by an augmented version of Ian Carr's band
Nucleus.
Neil had been commissioned in 1974 by the London Borough of Camden to write
a new work to mark the first major jazz festival in the UK for many years.
It was held at the Roundhouse in London in October of that year. He had
decided to extend the ideas worked out in the previous two albums to
complete the trilogy.
‘Kaleidoscope of Rainbows’ toured England the following year under the
auspices of the Contemporary Music Network of the Arts Council and became
its most successful attraction. A final concert before a packed house at the
Royal Festival Hall was so well received that Gull Records decided to record
and release Neil’s creation.
Neil was to record again - ‘Harmony of the Spheres’ in 1979 - but
thereafter his output was diminished by market forces out of kilter with
both the genre and the cost of making such ambitious recordings.
However, his career as a writer now safely underway, Neil focussed on the
literary life with children’s publisher Dorling Kindersley and is best
remembered in these circles for his award-winning The Way Things Work, which
sold 3 million copies worldwide.
By the time he retired in 2000, Neil had written over 100 books with total
sales of some 10 million copies.
His growing interest in electronic music evidenced in ‘Harmony Of the
Spheres’ evolved into with the electronic jazz group Zyklus, combining
improvisation with electronic methods of composition.
In 2002, Neil toured a revised version of ‘Kaleidoscope Of Rainbows’
with a performance at the Purcell Rooms in London with Jon Hiseman and other
jazz luminaries. His last jazz composition was ‘On The Four Winds’,
performed for Radio Three by New Perspectives in 1995.
His later interest in choral music led also to the composition of Creation
Mass (2001), a setting of 11 poems by long-term collaborator Patrick Huddie,
and what was to prove to be his last recording. Peter Muir
Kaleidoscope of Rainbows – Neil Ardley
(Dusk Fire; DUSKCD101) www.duskfire.co.uk
Released on March 21 2005 is distributed by Proper Music Distribution
For further information and a review copy
of Kaleidoscope of Rainbows contact Pat Tynan.
Pat Tynan Media
PO Box 785
Ickenham
Uxbridge
Middlesex
England UB10 8WQ
Office: +44 (0) 1895 636935 Mobile 07985 400297
An associate of SingSong Entertainment Publicity. http://www.singsongpr.biz/
