Artist: Colin Towns' Mask Orchestra
Title: The Orpheus Suite (CD)
Record Label: PROVOCATEUR
Catalogue No.: PVC2004
Year: 2004
Track listing:
- The Argonauts Hit Town (Arrival) (4.53)
- Love And The Sweet Farewell (2.58)
- Aristaeus And The Moisturisers (2.20)
- The Opium Flower Trap (Aristaeus And Eurydice) (5.32)
- 40 One Night Stands (The Band Goes On Tour) (3.21)
- Stepping In Tears Of Sadness (Funeral) (5.36)
- The Hellfire Club (Descend To Hades) (3.59)
- Orpheus And Eurydice (5.10)
- Ripped To Ribbons (Torn To Pieces) (2.37)
- Sacred Concert (7.12)
- * John (7.39)
Personnel
Trumpets: Nathan Bray, Graham Russell, Martin Shaw, Henry Lowther (tracks 1 - 8), Guy Barker, Andy Gibson (tracks 9 - 11)Trombones: Barnaby Dickinson, Liam Kirkman, Pat Hartley, Roger Williams
Saxophones: Peter King (alto and soprano), Alan Skidmore (tenor and soprano), Iain Dixon (tenor, soprano and clarinet), Simon Allen (alto and soprano), Jay Craig (baritone and bass clarinet)
Piano: David Hartley
Keyboards: Steve Lodder, Colin Towns
Double Bass and Electric Bass: Dudley Phillips (tracks 1 - 8), Thad Kelly (tracks 9 - 11)
Drums: Ian Thomas
Guitar: John Parricelli
Percussion: Paul Clarvis, Kevin Earley, Paul Parker
Timpanist: Dominic Hackett
Conductor: Colin Towns
Recording details
Produced by: Colin TownsEngineered by: Toby Wood
Recorded at Phoenix Sound, Wembley
Mixed at Canterbury Studios
All compositions by Colin Towns
* bonus track, also considered for the ballet
Track 9 features the members of the band playing kitchen utensils
Tracks 10 and 11 were originally commissioned by the NDR Big Band, Hamburg
Sacred Concert was originally titled Trash Talk
The Orpheus Suite is the third part in a trilogy of ballets inspired by the life and music of the great jazz composer and bandleader Duke Ellington. By the mid 1930s, the fame of Duke Ellington and his orchestra was such that it was a household name the length and breadth of the USA. In 1936, the band undertook a tour of the southern states and in order to provide both safety and convenience, as hotels and restaurants in the south were still racially segregated, the band travelled in its own deluxe Pullman railroad train. David Brintley uses the metaphor of the Ellington train in his ballet, and the Argonauts, who originally travelled by boat, arrive by train
The Orpheus Suite by Colin Towns was commissioned by David Brintley of Birmingham Royal Ballet and was premiered on October 6th 2004 in Birmingham, UK. The suite is part of a trilogy of jazz ballets, which includes Duke Ellington's The Nutcracker Sweeties and The Shakespeare Suite; collectively entitled Such Sweet Thunder when performed on stage