A melodic set of improvisations composed by bass clarinetist Chris Cundy, using approaches for songwriting to create compelling jazz compositions, in a band with Fyfe Dangerfield on piano, Mat Martin on guitar, Hannah Marshall on cello, Mark Sanders on drums and Dominic Lash on bass.
Format: CD Condition: New Released: 2016 Country: Great Britain Packaging: Digipack Recorded at Wincraft Studio in Gloucestershire, United Kingdom, on the June 2nd and 3rd, 2015, by
"Rather than blurring lines I want to see how a coexistence between composition and improvisation can bring out eccentricities in the music, where they interrupt each other, and how this throws things into high relief. For a number of years I have worked with songwriters, in popular music, and theatre. Rather than keeping my interests separate I wanted to combine some of these elements.
To some extent this project follows on from Gannets - the tea dance gone wrong band, which also features Fyfe Dangerfield and Dominic Lash as well as myself. The aim with Gustav Lost was to keep the spontaneity we had enjoyed in that group but to combine it with some rather different energies and structures. The joy of doing this is that I can create segments of music which sustain cyclical moods but also enter sudden changes of direction.
It was important that compositions work as fully formed ideas that can exist in their own right. I'm not interested in composing music that attempts to mimic the complexities at the heart of improvisation. In many ways I want to respect the improvisations that we as musicians have made together and are still in the process of making. Music should be given its own space in which it can breath, surprise, express a madness of its own, or whatever it is that liberates that part of our psyche. I wanted an aspect of music-in-the-making to be portrayed on these recordings."-Chris Cundy