Catching Sunlight
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“His compositional building blocks, repeated ostinati, short motifs that shift through registers and keys, and choppy phrasing alternated with smoother melodic or freely improvised sections, remain the basis of his technique, but the structures are tighter and his playing more deftly controlled than on his earlier recordings”. Alyn Shipton – Piano Magazine
“Rich and colourful music from one of the UK’s most talented and ambitious young jazz composers”. The Jazz Mann
“Stapleton’s writing mostly revolves around propulsive piano vamps with nods to Gil/Miles circa Sketches of Spain”. Jazzwise
“Here is some of the best new jazz around, both in conception and writing and its performance is exquisite. It really is brilliant”. Cardiff Jazz Scoiety CD Reviews
“..rich and colourful, the LSQ provide harmonic ’thickening’ to the ensemble sound as well as the odd sonorous, graceful solo (Joel Garthwaite’s soprano particularly ear-catching, with its almost oboe-like purity and elegance), and Yates [is] compelling, vibrant and agile throughout. It is Stapleton’s compositional skill, however, that immediately impresses, not only for its emotional range, but also for the variety of subtle and vigorous rhythms he utilises in the creation of this thoroughly enjoyable, intelligent but lively suite of pieces”. Vortex Jazz CD Review
Dave Stapleton (piano, composer)
Neil Yates (trumpet)
Paula Gardiner (bass)
Elliot Bennett (drums)
Lunar Saxophone Quartet
Joel Garthwaite (soprano)
Hannah Riches (alto)
Lewis Evans (tenor)
Lauren Hamer (baritone)
Catching Sunlight (poem by Julie Tippetts)
1. Treading the Earth
2. Catching Sunlight
3. Dancing Round Rocks
4. A Shady Mantle
5. Shimmers
6. Under the Canopy
7. Of Willow Fringe
8. Stepping Out
9. Beyond the Horizon
10. Stalking the Vision
11. Encircling the Ocean
All music by Dave Stapleton
Yates was an inspired choice – not only is he a formidable and gifted improviser, he is also a master of texture with one of the purest, most beautiful brass sounds in British Jazz. Stapleton uses him both as principle voice but also as a contrast to the softer, reedier sounds of the saxophones, just as the improvisation contrasts with the strong written material that underpins it. Each of these eleven tracks unfolds like the next movement in a symphony, as Stapleton draws on a staggering breadth of compositional ideas and influences. Most remarkable of all, is the way that this young composer shows how extended composition in Jazz can be both cerebral but still ‘retain the Funk’, to use George Russell’s well-chosen phrase.
The Lunar Saxophone Quartet aim to bring New Music to the widest possible audience without pandering or patronising. Their standards are exacting and they only commission the best. Their next CD FLUX will feature new works by Graham Fitkin, Andrew Poppy, Michael Nyman and Gabriel Jackson. With Catching Sunlight they succeed on all counts and Dave Stapleton joins this august company.
Comparisons can be odious but surely these are textures as diverse and lush as those of Gil Evans and Miles on Sketches of Spain and yet its sense of movement recalls Mingus and Ellington. Once again, as with Stapleton and Matthew Bourne’s Dismantling the Waterfall (Edition 1001), the titles for these pieces are taken from a poem by Julie Tippetts. Each line somehow capturing the mood of its piece. As The Lunar Saxophone Quartet weave and intertwine these delightful dancing melodies over the rhythm section’s steady, supple pulse and Neil Yates’ trumpet floats above the ensemble. There are so many delights to be discovered in Catching Sunlight. Words, however, well-chosen are sometimes simply not enough.
Catching Sunlight is an album everone should own
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