Release date: 20 November 2024
Between 2011 and 2019 there were 21 seasons and 95 gigs, at Club Inégales. Hosted by law firm Hodge, Jones and Allen in their bar at Euston, London, in an extraordinary act of sponsorship.
The gigs always had the same 3-set form. First, resident band Notes Inégales, then guests, then together, worked out on the day. Starting with ‘backbone’ scores, or the music of the guests, but always with a great deal of improvisation.
The wide range of guests included guitarist Lionel Loueke, folk trio Leveret, Maori shaman Horo Horomona, street children from the Alfanar puppet project in Cairo, and The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.
Director Peter Wiegold has long wanted to make a CD of the project, with the intention that all 95 gigs would be heard in it somewhere! So the process has started with this single, featuring six gigs. The quixotic poetry (and voice) of Murray Lachlan Young, the edginess of radical pop Gazelle Twin, wonderful freewheeling improv. from Living Room in London, singing textures and electronics from string duo Max Baillie and Robin Michael, sonic echos from Swiss percussionist Christophe Fellay and heart and soul from the mbira and voice of Zena Edwards. So from gigs 1, 2, 4, 6, 54, and 94!
They are woven together here around Murray’s poetry, looking for the bigger sound of the club over those nine years - inclusive and heading, not so much for fusion, as for the joy and chemistry of difference.
Zena Edwards mbira and voice
Murray Lachlan Young voice and poetry
Christophe Fellay percussion
Living Room in London: Ellie Fagg violin | Tom Norris violin | Gregor Riddell cello | Pepe Auer bass clarinet | Mano Delago handpan
Max Baillie violin
Robin Michael cello
Gazelle Twin
Notes Inégales: Christian Forshaw saxophone | Joel Bell guitar | Martin Butler piano | Simon Limbrick percussion | Ben Markland bass
Peter Wiegold director and keyboards
FUNDERS
Arts Council England
Hodge, Jones and Allen
RECORDING CREDITS
RECORDED BY:
Graeme Shaw
Mārtiņš Baumanis
Louie Marlow-Smith
Edited by Peter Wiegold with Martin Butler
Mixed and mastered by Chris Lewis