John Taylor - 6th May 2012

We don't know much about Jazz but every Cheltenham festival we try to select a balance of familiar musicians ( this year Seb Rochford and Roberta Fonseca) and new acts to us. Yesterday this proved successful with Sheelanagig and today it was the turn of John Taylor, an accomplished pianist celebrating his 70th birthday with a new piece commissioned by the BBC.

He duly surrrounded himself with an accomplished seven piece band featuring two of his sons and established players like Henning Berg on trombone and Julian Arguelles on Saxophone etc. As he explained at the start the piece is based on Kurt Vonnegut Jr's book " Harrison Bergeron" with each segment relating to particular characters and pivotal moments.

This undoubtedly helped from an audience perspective. As you listen you can decide if you like a tune or not but if you understand the thought process behind it it helps to paint a picture in your head.

This wasn't always an easy listen but it was interesting to compare with more sedate Seb Rochford/ Kit Downes show the previous evening. Both performances had their merits while the additional instruments to Mr Taylor which obviously helped to provide a more varied sound.

He,of course, as composer and pianist was the central figure and thoroughly deserved the tumultuous applause he received at the end. We may never have heard of him at the beginning of the festival but we would definitely add him to the (growing) list of people we would see again.