We Out Here Festival ,Cambridgeshire, August 15-18
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Topic: We Out Here Festival ,Cambridgeshire, August 15-18Posted By: snobb
Subject: We Out Here Festival ,Cambridgeshire, August 15-18
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2019 at 11:01am
Gilles Peterson interview: 'Clubs are closing, but in this country we always find an answer to the problem'
https://www.standard.co.uk/topic/gilles-peterson" rel="nofollow - Gilles Peterson couldn’t be happier. The https://www.standard.co.uk/go/london/music/we-out-here-festival-2019-line-up-supper-club-record-fair-a4211441.html" rel="nofollow - We Out Here
festival, his inaugural “jazz Woodstock”, begins this Thursday on 220
acres of lush, landscaped Cambridgeshire countryside. Yet the DJ and
record-label owner’s ear-to-ear grin is partly fixed in disbelief. “This
is jazz,” says Peterson, 57, laughing. “I’m almost traumatised after
years of being battered for using the word in this country. When I used
to play on Radio 1, I would put on heavy jazz but I wouldn’t call it
that because I knew that as soon as I mention the word people would
switch off.”
To have 10,000 people descending on a jazz festival is big news
but it’s not altogether a surprise. Something deeply rooted in the
public’s perception of the genre has shifted. People don’t bring up The
Fast Show’s Louis Balfour, presenter of Jazz Club, and his “niiiiice”
catchphrase when Peterson mentions jazz now, he says, and the days of
Ron Burgundy’s jazz flute jokes are fading. https://www.standard.co.uk/go/london/music/london-jazz-british-uk-best-artists-venues-ezra-collective-a4127681.html" rel="nofollow - British jazz is booming
— and Peterson declares ridicule has given way to reverence. “I’m
taking this stuff to America and France, and all they’re talking about
is the British invasion of jazz over there,” he says.
“The pairing of electronic music with jazz has brought things
forward,” says We Out Here’s co-founder, Noah Ball, who, having
successfully directed the Outlook and Dimensions festivals in Croatia
since 2008, spotted the commercial potential of a jazz-focused festival
in the UK at https://www.standard.co.uk/topic/field-day" rel="nofollow - Field Day in Brockwell Park last year.
Ball wants to let the natural landscape form the festival’s
backdrop, rather than MDF facades, eschewing the “bells-and-whistles”
approach. Although his focus is on the clarity of the sound, Peterson
too knows how to craft a compelling festival aesthetic; he has 13 years
of experience curating the uniquely picturesque Worldwide Festival in
the French seaside town of Sčte (DJs on the beach by day, parties in an
amphitheatre overlooking the Mediterranean by night). We Out Here will
be a celebration of old soul, jazz and disco; live jazz but not as we
know it, on 10 stages scattered throughout a bucolic stretch of
countryside that boasts three lakes, a forest and an old causeway track
(for 10 years, the site was home to Secret Garden Party, a boutique
summer festival that ran until 2014).
But this irruption of sound comes straight from London’s effervescent underbelly. “A lot of https://www.standard.co.uk/go/london/music/london-jazz-british-uk-best-artists-venues-ezra-collective-a4127681.html" rel="nofollow - the London jazz scene
were brought up on bass music and grime, so jazz is being infected with
those basslines, and those attitudes of the London sound, pushing it
back into youth consciousness,” Ball says. Spotify told The Guardian
that 40 per cent of jazz listening on its streaming website is by people
under 30, rising year on year since 2016; another website, Deezer,
reported a 15 per cent increase in 18- to 25-year-olds streaming jazz in
the past year. Peterson thinks the frictionless browsing habits of “the
iTunes generation” has allowed “jazz-leaning” music to find a wider
audience. “On the one hand the algorithms have taken over, but, on the
other, a 15-year-old can learn about artists that it took me five years
to discover in a single night”.
Peterson’s own label, Brownswood Recordings, has been influential in
championing the UK’s “underground jazz messengers” since 2006; last
February it released the We Out Here compilation, with tracks from nine
British groups including London-based Afrobeat eight-piece KOKOROKO, the
Mobo-winning https://www.standard.co.uk/go/london/music/sons-of-kemet-frontman-shabaka-hutchings-i-trust-in-my-ability-to-write-really-dope-s-a3924616.html" rel="nofollow - Sons of Kemet and saxophonist https://www.standard.co.uk/go/london/music/nubya-garcia-interview-pop-has-set-roles-but-for-me-each-gig-is-different-a3824121.html" rel="nofollow - Nubya Garcia , all of whom will appear at We Out Here.
Care has been taken to fine-tune the festival environment;
state-of-the art sound systems have been picked to take up less space in
transit to save on the festival’s carbon footprint; the twinkling
forest stage will stay open late to the sound of sparring drums and
percussive horn flares. The cultural programme will also lean into
dance, jungle, techno and reggae, as well as film screenings.
It’s an astonishing achievement, given that Peterson claims to
have had the idea with Ball just six months ago. “I can’t take credit,”
says Peterson. “The movement’s reached a critical mass who are rivals in
a positive way, making each other step up their game.”
It’s the kind of character-led curation that only adds to
intrigue abroad. Last year The New York Times gushed that “now more than
ever, the easiest answer to that pesky question — what’s keeping jazz
vital these days? — appears to lie in London”, pointing to the
breakthrough tenor sax, tuba and twin drum-set thrust of Sons of Kemet
(Shabaka Hutchings, Sons of Kemet’s statesmanlike saxophonist, anchors a
handful of his own bands and served as the musical director for the We
Out Here compilation).
This year https://www.standard.co.uk/topic/glastonbury" rel="nofollow - Glastonbury
was praised for putting British jazz centre stage, with Sons of Kemet,
The Comet is Coming and Ezra Collective playing. And while it’s a
running joke that the Mercury shortlist always has a token jazz album,
including one has become a necessity (this year Seed Ensemble’s
Driftglass, while https://www.standard.co.uk/go/london/music/black-midi-schlagenheim-album-tour-uk-dates-london-a4171391.html" rel="nofollow - Black Midi ’s Schlagenheim is accompanied by the jazz-influenced Grey Area by Little Simz).
Peterson says creativity is pouring out of the UK in trying
circumstances. “In England the reason we do so well, ironically, is
because we have to do it ourselves,” he says, pointing to a lack of arts
funding. Clubs such as Hackney’s Total Refreshment Centre and
Deptford’s Steam Down have been incubators for the young scene. At the
same time, influential pioneers such as Gary Crosby and his formative
Tomorrow’s Warriors, who have provided a platform for talented young
musicians who wished to pursue a career in jazz, now struggle without
desperately needed grants funding.
“Yes they’re closing down clubs but in this country we always
find an answer to the problem when it comes to entertainment and doing
it ourselves,” says Peterson. “That’s what I love so much about England.
It doesn’t happen anywhere else in the world”.
We Out Here Festival is at Secret Garden Party, Cambridgeshire ( https://www.weoutherefestival.com/" rel="nofollow - weoutherefestival.com ), August 15-18
from www.standard.co.uk
Replies: Posted By: snobb
Date Posted: 21 Aug 2019 at 1:35am
We Out Here festival review – a new jazz generation is born
Abbots Ripton, Cambridgeshire
Saxophonist Gary
Bartz, Joe Armon-Jones and Binker Golding were some of the big names at
this festival curated by Gilles Peterson
A festival curated by https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/jul/10/confidence-and-swagger-how-melbournes-future-jazz-scene-won-over-gilles-peterson" rel="nofollow - DJ Gilles Peterson ,
named after the UK jazz compilation his label Brownswood Recordings
released in 2018, and featuring almost all of the artists on their
roster, might seem like a vanity project. Yet the last two years have
seen this output spawn something far bigger than one man. The result of
years of work by grassroots organisations such as https://tomorrowswarriors.org/" rel="nofollow - Tomorrow’s Warriors and https://www.kinetikabloco.co.uk/" rel="nofollow - Kinetika Bloco training up a new generation of musicians, it has created that most sought-after of cultural phenomena: a “scene”.
This scene is largely rooted in the twentysomethings of south
London who have a predilection for saxophone solos, Afrobeat, Dr
Martens and Dickies. And they are all out in force for the inaugural We
Out Here festival at the idyllic former https://www.theguardian.com/music/secret-garden-party" rel="nofollow - Secret Garden Party site in Cambridgeshire.
Saxophonist https://www.binkergolding.com/" rel="nofollow - Binker Golding
represents this new school of London jazz players. He delivers a
pared-down set of songs taken from his forthcoming album Abstractions of
Reality Past and Beautiful Feathers. His keening melodic lines are as
intricate and impressionistic as the title, with pianist https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/nov/17/danya-stephenssarah-tandy-review-london-jazz-festival" rel="nofollow - Sarah Tandy providing rock-steady backing. Golding’s https://www.theguardian.com/music/2018/sep/13/binker-moses-review-boyd-golding-london-jazz-stars" rel="nofollow - longtime collaborator Moses Boyd also plays a sun-soaked set of Afrobeat and electronic textures, including his breakout dance floor track https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbF3StGHMUk" rel="nofollow - Rye Lane Shuffle , while pianist https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/jun/29/one-to-watch-joe-armon-jones" rel="nofollow - Joe Armon-Jones explores dub-jazz with vocalist Asheber wielding a wooden staff and delivering excoriating verses on the Grenfell Tower fire.
Just as Peterson made his name through open-minded DJing residencies
in the 90s that covered house music and hip-hop as much as jazz, at We
Out Here there is also much to be seen outside jazz. This includes a
large broken beat contingent, featuring Marc Mac of pioneering group
4hero, DJ Shy One and producer Ahadadream all providing fizzing,
energetic sets to keep the dancers going, while Benji B and Lefto delve
deep into fractal breakbeats, firing percussive missives in the pouring
rain.
Nevertheless, the most gratifying moments of the festival are still
the appearances of the jazz greats, proving the lineage that has made
this recent revival so potent. Idris Ackamoor and the Pyramids take up
the afro-spiritual mantle exemplified by https://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/jun/15/sun-ra-jazz-interstellar-voyager" rel="nofollow - Sun Ra with a set that features https://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/feb/01/hey-whats-that-sound-keytar" rel="nofollow - keytar ,
spoken word and a beautiful doubling between Ackamoor’s sax and a bowed
violin. Free-jazz heavyweight Gary Bartz plays the festival with
vocalist Dwight Trible, who brings his free-association compositions to
life, his honeyed baritone conversing with Bartz’s tender tenor.
Where other scenes have capitulated to branded commercialisation or
been relegated to dinner party music, the diversity of this new jazz
generation, matching and continuing the legacy of their forebears, feels
like a genuine, communal movement that will continue to defy
commodification.
• This article was amended on 20 August
2019 to remove a reference to Skee Mask, who pulled out of the festival.
In addition, Gary Bartz was billed as a headliner, however he did not
close the festival as an earlier version said.