IAN BRIGHTON - A VOICE YOU LEFT BEHIND (SOUNDCLOUD, 2014)

Here is a wonderful piece of news and a treat for us all. Ian Brighton is recording again!

Ian has kindly emailed a few times and I have summarized some of his news.

Hi Nick,

At nearly 70 I have decided to come out of retirement, so to speak, and start recording again: I stopped playing in 1990 after finishing the FMR 001 album, Eleven Years From Yesterday. I could never play full time, as I had a family and required a steady income.  However I kept playing the guitar over the years developing my improvisation forms, but no opportunity to perform in public. Just before I retired from work five years ago, I spoke to Evan Parker, who said something along the lines, "You should come back and start playing again, most of your old friends are still living". After Lol Coxhill passed on, I started listening to our old tapes and realised that my playing has changed so much since those early recordings. Therefore I decided to start recording again and these days it is so much easier with Pro Tools.

I thought you maybe interested that I have released a track called, "A voice you left behind" on my Facebook page Ian Brighton Art and Music.

This is dedicated to Derek Bailey, my mentor and friend. Before the improvisation there is a short section with Derek being interviewed about peoples approach to listening to improvisation. When Derek passed away I felt a tremendous sense of loss, because I always considered him like a distant cousin, who I was close to for a while and thereafter knew I could always call him and it would be just like yesterday. Although he was a massive influence, I never sought out to copy him, as having small hands, I could not stretch my fingers over the fretboard to achieve the same chordal structures.

Next week, I hope to be releasing another one called "Chasing Lol". We played together many times, especially in duet form and it was always a wonderful challenge. In many ways he was a similar player to Sonny Rollins, in as much as his ideas were out of nowhere; sometimes gentle and then with great ferocity; the music being so varied. I will also use as a prelude to the improvisation a comment he made to me on stage at the 1979 Bracknell Jazz Festival, when a man in audience called out for A Night in Tunisia.

These tracks are part of a series of improvisations I will be releasing, where I think of the character as part of the improvisation, instead of just playing a solo performance comprising different aspects of my playing, where I am drawing from my library of sounds. 

Another track will be a conversation with myself, similar to Bill Evans. I am using acoustic and electric guitars in the way that he used acoustic and electric piano but instead of improvising on a particular tune I am using the same approach as per Derek and Lol; to focus on the character.

My son Paul Brighton aka Cuz Beats has recorded and produced the tracks. He is also featured on one of them, when he produces live electronic sound that I use as a background to another improvisation.

If you like the track, please share with other like minded people. It can be downloaded from Soundcloud.

Best regards

Ian


The track is great and more to come!

A very happy 70th birthday to Ian.