Django Bates

Django was born in a house near New Beckenham Station. A ropy, semitone flat D'Almaine Piano was the most fascinating toy in the house. He found the clatter of railway workers working throughout the night comforting, but had reoccurring nightmares about a Hippopotamus head slowly moving from one side of the ceiling to the other, and of having fluttering moths stuck between his toes. When he was three and a half, Django and sister Paddy were taken by their parents, Frances and Ralf, on a tour of Europe. They travelled in a motorbike and side-car. The door kept flying open as they trundled through France, Austria, Italy, Romania and Yugoslavia. They lived on stolen maize blackened over fires, and Icecreams given to Django in exchange for having blond hair. At one point Romanian Gypsies gave the Bates family a wooden mug full of warm frothy milk which they had just pulled from a cow.

At eleven years old Django got himself several paper-rounds. At 6.0 a.m, an old radiogram would wake everyone in the house except Django: he would be shaken awake by whoever cracked first. After paper-rounds he'd cycle to Sedgehill Comprehensive School and receive a fully comprehensive education. Some of it he remembers still: James the First had a very big tongue and was the wisest fool in Christendom, the hanging gardens of Babylon looked amazing, ... er, that's it.

After school Django would go back to the houses he'd delivered papers to and say 'I'm collecting unwanted paper for World Conservation'. Thus was amassed a huge pile of paper which he would weigh on bathroom scales. When one ton was reached, it would be collected by a recycling company from Greenwich, and Django would receive sixteen pounds. The aim was to buy a tape recorder with 'Sound on Sound' capabilities. He eventually reached one hundred and sixty six pounds and bought one, but never managed to operate it.

Django wet the bed until he was 15, and to this day he finds it hard to act his age. Various alarm bells, zinc-plated sheets and odd bed angles were tried as cures, to no avail. It has been suggested that these attempted cures have given his music an odd tilt and an obsession with alarming surprises.

Many friends and vagrants passed through the family home: lots were artists or musicians who gave Django music lessons. A few were unknown to the Bates family, and it was a mystery what they were doing in the house at all. Django's mother encouraged him to attend weird old folks' houses for lessons on trumpet, piano, violin and guitar whilst his father played eccentric music from all genres at him from babyhood onwards. (violin on boat photo)

Bill Bruford: The Summerfold Collection 1987-2008

by John Kelman
September 2, 2023

Intrepid percussionist/composer/bandleader Bill Bruford began his career in the late '60s art-rock arena with Yes and, later, King Crimson, but jazz has always moved underneath, like an eddying current. His early recordings, well documented on the companion Winterfold Collection, may not speak the language of jazz, but they possess its spirit. By 1986, Bruford was looking for a new path. Crimson had again dissolved, the 1981-'84 incarnation having provided him with the opportunity to explore nascent electronic drum ...

Album Review

Django Bates: Tenacity

Read "Tenacity" reviewed by Pat Youngspiel

by Pat Youngspiel
November 20, 2020

Few jazz artists go to such great lengths to make their audience feel at the same time bewildered by humor-infused technical exhaustion and smitten by charm and sheer musical beauty as Django Bates does. The English pianist and composer has gained a reputation over the years, for bringing the quirkiest and widest range of ideas and styles to a, more or less, aesthetically-serious art form. Some might even claim he's the Frank Zappa of jazz. Then again, who's to say ...

Radio & Podcasts

A Night at the Jazz Circus! - Part 1

by Ludovico Granvassu
November 10, 2020

Circus is like Jazz. They both require a great deal of originality and a capacity to improvise and be in the moment. They come out of a sense of urgency and self-expression since artists do not embrace them to get rich. And they both demand incredible dedication and discipline. This week we explore the connections between these two performative art forms, focusing on jazz inspired by the circus world, composed for circus shows, or evoking—in a way or ...

Album Review

Django Bates: Tenacity

by John Kelman
October 9, 2020

It's been a long time since that late May, 2013 week in Luleå, Sweden, where pianist Django Bates and his Belovèd Trio first collaborated with the renowned Norrbotten Big Band. Fully documented in the All About Jazz article Django Bates: From Zero to Sixty in Five Days, Bates, bassist Petter Eldh and drummer Peter Bruun, along with other non-Norrbotteners, including guitarist Markus Pesonen, tubaist Daniel Herskedal and trombonist/vocalist Ashley Slater, made the lengthy trek to this small coastal town, located ...

Lyrics

Django Bates: 60+40—Charlie Parker: 100

by Vic Albani
September 7, 2020

Nel nefasto 2020 molte celebrazioni, anniversari e festival a tema hanno dovuto arrendersi all'emergenza Covid-19 anche se, in calendario, ne sono rimasti alcuni davvero irrinunciabili. Uno di questi è il centenario della nascita del signor Charlie Parker, nato a Kansas City il 29 agosto 1920 e scomparso poi a New York nella primavera del 1955. Ad uno dei nomi “must" del jazz di tutti i tempi sono dedicati nel corso dell'anno decine e decine di omaggi, ricordi, commemorazioni, festival interi ...

Album Review

Bill Bruford's Earthworks: Earthworks Complete

Read "Earthworks Complete" reviewed by John Kelman

by John Kelman
July 3, 2019

Since retiring as a professional musician in 2009, progressive/art rock turned jazz drummer Bill Bruford has successfully managed to maintained a place in the public eye. Beyond his engaging, informative and successful Bill Bruford: The Autobiography (Jawbone Press, 2009), the drummer/percussionist has more recently released a second, equally captivating book, Uncharted: Creativity and the Expert Drummer (University of Michigan Press, 2018).Initially stemming from the success of his autobiography but since assuming a life of its own (and no ...

Interview

Django Bates: Generous Abundance

by Ludovico Granvassu
June 22, 2018

If you love jazz because of its capacity to surprise, amaze, astound, even flabbergast, and leave you without words, then Django Bates is the musician for you. A bird's-eye view [no pun nor reference to Bates' love for the music Charlie Parker intended] of the striking body of work the British pianist has developed over four decades reveals what must be a very generous disposition. His projects and music can range from the subtle, delicate and reassuring to the bombastic, ...

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Django Bates

Source: Michael Ricci
October 2, 2022

All About Jazz is celebrating Django Bates' birthday today!

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Django Bates

Source: Michael Ricci
October 2, 2021

All About Jazz is celebrating Django Bates' birthday today!

Birthday

Jazz Musician of the Day: Django Bates

Source: Michael Ricci
October 2, 2020

All About Jazz is celebrating Django Bates' birthday today!

141

Interview

Loose Tubes' Django Bates and Mark Lockheart Interiewed at All About Jazz

Source: All About Jazz
March 7, 2011

Twenty years after legendary British big band Loose Tubes played its farewell gigs at Ronnie Scott's Club in London, its first live album, Dancing On Frith Street (Lost Marble Records, 2010), became Jazzwise magazine's Archive Album of 2010. In the intervening decades, the band's members had spread across the British and international jazz scenes to become some of the most influential players around. The quality and power of the music on the album served as a welcome reminder of the ...
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380

Festival

Jazz at Snape Proms 2010 - A Star Line-Up

Source: Michael Ricci
May 29, 2010

Snape Maltings Concert Hall, set in the beautiful Suffolk countryside, is one of the loveliest music venues in the UK.

This year's Snape Proms brings yet more diversity to Snape Maltings Concert Hall with a programme that is both exciting and innovative. Maceo Parker brings the audience to its feet on the first weekend, Sunday 1 August at 7:30pm with one of the greatest ever exponents of funk. He navigates between James Brown's 1960s soul and George Clinton's 1970s freaky ...
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311

Interview

Pianist/Composer Django Bates Interviewed at AAJ

Source: All About Jazz
July 14, 2008

July, 2008: It's been 13 years since British keyboard player and composer Django Bates released the third album in his “four seasons" series, Winter Truce (And Homes Blaze) (Winter & Winter, 1995). That album followed close behind Autumn Fire (And Green Shoots) (Winter & Winter, 1994) and Summer Fruits (And Unrest) (Winter & Winter, 1993).

It has long been Bates's intention to complete the series with a spring-themed album, and in June, 2008 he finally did so with Spring Is ...
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254

Event