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Barry Guy
Barry Guy is an innovative double bass player and composer whose creative diversity in the fields of Jazz improvisation, solo recitals, chamber and orchestral performance is the outcome both of an unusually varied training and a zest for experimentation, underpinned by a dedication to the double bass and the ideal of musical communication.
Between the early Seventies and mid Nineties Barry Guy held principal bass position in various orchestras including The Orchestra of St.John’s Smith Square, City of London Sinfonia, Monteverdi Orchestra, The Academy of Ancient Music, Kent Opera and The London Classical Players. During these years he was also active in the European Improvised Scene.
He is founder and Artistic Director of the London Jazz Composers Orchestra for which he has written several extended works with recordings of the following: Ode (Incus 1972 and re-released on Intakt 1996), Stringer (FMP 1980), Polyhymnia on ZURICH CONCERTS (Intakt 1988), Harmos (Intakt 1989), Double Trouble (Intakt 1990), Theoria (Intakt 1992) with the Swiss pianist Irène Schweizer as soloist, Portraits (Intakt 1994) and Three Pieces for Orchestra (Intakt 1997).
His concert works have been widely performed and his skilful and inventive writing has resulted in an exceptional series of compositions: Flagwalk (1983), The Eye of Silence (1988), Look Up! (1990), After the Rain (1992), Bird Gong Game (1992), Fallingwater (1996), Redshift (1998), Remembered Earth (1999), Nasca Lines (2001), Inachis (2002), Folio (2002) and Anaklasis (2003).
Look Up! was honoured with the Royal Philharmonic Society Award for Chamber-Scale Composition 1991-1992. Guy's compositions usually reflect a personal liaison with musicians and ensembles he writes for. As such, the commissions arrive from chamber orchestras, chamber groups and soloists interested in contemporary musical performance with a special commitment to communicate with the audience. Guy's works therefore have a sense of freshness without recourse to ideological excesses or scores that baffle players to the extent that performing becomes a trial.
The scores however are virtuosic and often present innovative sonorities and extended instrumental techniques and as a performer himself he is ideally placed to assess these possibilities.
Barry Guy continues to give solo recitals throughout Europe as well as continuing associations with colleagues involved in improvised, baroque and contemporary music. His current regular ensembles are the Homburger/Guy duo, the Parker/Guy duo, piano trios with Marilyn Crispell and Paul Lytton, Jaques Demierre and Lucas Niggli and a recently formed trio with Agusti Fernandez and Ramon Lopez. He continues the longstanding trio with Evan Parker and Paul Lytton as well as projects with Mats Gustafsson.
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Barry Guy's Blue Shroud Band Ten Year Anniversary
by John Sharpe
Barry Guy Blue Shroud Band Ten Year Anniversary Krakow Jazz Autumn (Krakowska Jesien Jazzowa) Klub Alchemia and Manggha Hall jny:Krakow November 19-24, 2024 Intro If bassist Barry Guy had only found fame as an improviser, his place in the pantheon would be assured. However a singular approach to his instrument and collaborations with the likes of Evan Parker, Cecil Taylor, Bill Dixon, Marilyn Crispell, Mats Gustafsson, Derek Bailey, and Howard Riley represent only one ...
Continue ReadingIzumi Kimura / Barry Guy / Gerry Hemingway: Six Hands Open As One
by John Sharpe
Although dating back to at least Aesop's fables written in 500 BC, the saying that you can know someone by the company they keep remains as true as ever. While Irish-based Japanese pianist Izumi Kimura is the nominal leader, the egalitarian trio on Six Hands Open As One finds her in illustrious company. Bassist Barry Guy and drummer Gerry Hemingway have both led storied careers which defy concise summation, but Guy's affinity for the format is worth ...
Continue ReadingJordina Millà, Barry Guy: Live in Munich
by Neri Pollastri
Stupefacente incontro tra generazioni diverse di improvvisatori, questo album documenta il concerto tenutosi nel Febbraio 2022 nella sala Schwere Reiter di Monaco di Baviera, di scena la pianista catalana residente a Salisburgo Jordina Millà e il contrabbassista inglese Barry Guy. Se di quest'ultimo è inutile aggiungere altro, trattandosi di uno dei grandi interpreti dell'improvvisazione europea dell'ultimo mezzo secolo, della pianista può invece essere utile dire che ha svolto solidi studi classici prima di imbattersi nel corregionale Agustí Fernández, altro magnifico ...
Continue ReadingTony Oxley: Unreleased 1974 - 2016
by Chris May
The British drummer and bandleader Tony Oxley passed in 2023, aged 85, after a career which began in the mid 1960s as the drummer in the house band at Ronnie Scott's club. From this prestigious but relatively codified platform, Oxley soon steered into less travelled waters. In 1969 he was in the quartet which recorded John McLaughlin's debut album, Extrapolation (Polydor). In the early 1970s, he began adding ring modulators, tone generators and other fx tools to his assemblage of ...
Continue ReadingJordina Millà and Barry Guy: Live In Munich
by Mike Jurkovic
There is an elusive, impossible logic to Live In Munich, an album that could sound so much like so many before it. But it does not. Because the music that roils tidal between Catalan pianist Jordina Millà and British bassist Barry Guy on their debut concert performance may be more the sound of creation than music as listeners have come to comfortably conceive it. Categorically ECM recordings contain creative fire and brimstone, symphonic contours, minimalist patina, and concepts ...
Continue ReadingIzumi Kimura, Barry Guy, Gerry Hemingway: Six Hands Open As One
by Ian Patterson
It should come as no surprise that three of contemporary music's great improvisers should obliterate the boundaries between composed and improvised music. This is the second collaboration between pianist Izumi Kimura, double bassist Barry Guy and drummer/percussionist Gerry Hemingway following Illuminated Silence (Fundacja Sluchaj, 2019), a visceral live document where improvisation played out within conceptual compositional frameworks. Six Hands As One charts a similar course, the trio responding to a range of stimuli including the natural elements, poetry and war. ...
Continue ReadingOliver Schwerdt: Fucking Ballads
by Glenn Astarita
Pianist Oliver Schwerdt's Fucking Ballads is not just an album title; it is a declaration of sonic defiance, a rallying cry for those who dare to challenge the status quo. The juxtaposition of the genteel term ballads" with the bold expletive fucking" sets the stage for a musical escapade that is as cheeky as it is profound. From the opening notes of the album, Schwerdt and his ensemble are on a mission to disrupt the conventions of jazz. ...
Continue ReadingThe world premiere of Barry Guy's new composition "The Blue Shroud"
Source:
Maxim Micheliov
The world première of Barry Guy’s new composition “The Blue Shroud” will take place in jny: Krakow, Poland on November 21st. During the three preceding rehearsal days , there will be concerts every evening in the famous Alchemia Club. This will involve his new ensemble the “BLUE SHROUD BAND” Barry Guy – bass and director (GB) Savina Yannatou – voice (GR) Agusti Fernandez – piano (ESP) Ben Dwyer – guitar (IR) Peter Evans – trumpet (USA) Maya Homburger – violin ...
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Agusti Fernandez, Barry Guy and Ramon Lopez - Morning Glory (Maya, 2010) ****1/2
Source:
Free Jazz by Stef Gijssels
By Stanley Zappa At its high points, Morning Glory is no less a musical achievement than the greatest of the great piano trios in our beloved music. Two that come to mind are the The Lowell Davidison Trio and Bill Evan's Sunday at the Village Vanguard. At their best Agusti Fernández, Barry Guy and Ramón López continue the larger, transcendent conversation begun by the players on those canonical recordings and could, for approximation reasons, be likened to a combination of ...
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