Paul Read News

I had a wonderful day on Saturday with the Paul Read Orchestra playing an exciting matinee at the Rex (3:30 to 6:30) and then got to sit in with Alex Dean and Brian O’Kane’s Blue Note band on piano on the 7:00 show. Great to play with drummer Barry Elmes (its been a while) and for the first time with Artie Roth (bass). I really loved the experience of playing in the rhythm section with Barry and Artie. I can recommend this as the perfect compliment to having done a big band gig. Lots of space and open minded playing on some great old Hank Mobley, Kenny Dorham and other composer’s tunes. Alex plays so great you forget how hilarious he is on mic and Brian is a brilliant and funny man in his own right. Plays his buns off as well.

Speaking of Barry Elmes… as you know Barry is on my quartet recording which features, Barry, Kieran Overs and Scott Robinson playing my compositions. (It’s all about me ) That recording is doing well on iTunes and other digital distributors. I hope to have a reunion with this band at some point. I just love Scott’s playing (on tenor and baritone, plus dozens of other instruments).

The orchestra (PRO) is recording a partial cd on Feb 10, so please check back to this site and also the orchestra’s site (being rejigged at the moment by brilliant designer, Lucie Frigault) at paulreadorchestra.com.

Writing lots of new large ensemble (jazz) these days for the orchestra and I am very excited about the recording. Also have become completely obsessed with the late Beethoven quartets and the 6 Bartok String Quartets. I am hoping to post some renderings of these quartets in the future in my downloads. I like to do this as I study and deconstruct the scores for these terrific pieces.

Speaking of string quartets. I have to tip my hat to Quinsin Nachoff for his unbelievable album, Magic Numbers. Bartok meets Debussy meets cutting edge jazz playing. Quinsin is a young genius in my opinion. Totally at ease with the saxophones and clarinet, his music has passion, intellect and groove. You can’t want for more than that.

Enough for now. See you later

Paul

First of all, Happy New Year. Just back from the IAJE conference in New York city. Aside from flight delays coming home it was a fun trip and a good break from some heartbreaking events at home.
My wife, Trish’s dad died on Jan 2. He was 90, but until a few weeks ago he was as healthy as can be. He had never been in a hospital. He was a brilliant man — a lawyer and then was appointed Chief Judge of the County and District Courts of Ontario. He was well loved by family of course, but was extremely influential and well loved in his professional life as well. He heard several rather famous cases in Ontario history, including the Barbara Turnbull trial many years ago.
As a father-in-law, I was mad about the man. He was brilliant and you could talk with him about any subject and he had tremendous insights and great wisdom. I found myself agreeing with him at nearly every turn. He had great humanity and humility. We will miss Judge “Bill” W.E.C. Colter greatly.

I also join the jazz world in mourning the passing of Michael Brecker. He was a great musician to be sure. One of THE greatest and most highly influential players of the players, immediately post-Trane. I had the great honour to meet him. Gave him a ride to a clinic at a local college where I was Director of Jazz Studies. We had a lot of personal stuff in common as it turned out. One of those: “I drive this same car, my wife’s name is Susan too (I was married to Susan McAlister at the time)”, and I was struck in that 40 minutes of private conversation at his self deprecating manner, his tremendous talent, his intellect and his friendliness. He was affable and even a bit nervous about the upcoming clinic during our ride. I found this astonishing since his celebrity (richly deserved and well earned) meant he only needed to walk into the room to make the clinic a success. And yet, he was concerned about what the students knew and didn’t know and I remember him saying he didn’t want to play any standards, because he suspected that many of the students could do that better than he. I said astonishing!

On a lighter note, I’d love you to check out the review Jack Bowers wrote for All About Jazz. The link is http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article.php?id=24331. I am very proud of the review.

Met Tom Hopkins of Garritan (GPO and JABB) fame at the IAJE conference. Another extremely likeable man.

Well enough for now. Hope to see you on Sept 27 at the REX in Toronto. The Paul Read Orchestra (PRO) will play a matinee performance (3:30 to 6:30) lots of new music.

See you soon

Paul