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Riding high on the success of its Valentyne Suite
(Vertigo 1969) release, jazz rock act Colosseum embarked in the summer of
1970 on a major UK tour.
To best showcase the album's full force, the band took Neil Ardley's New
Jazz Orchestra (NJO) on the road with them. It was a decision based on
mutual synergy: the NJO had already played on one track on Valentyne Suite,
Butty‘s Blues, and Colosseum members Jon Hiseman, Tony Reeves, Dave
Greenslade and Dick Heckstall-Smith had all played previously with Ardley's
big band.
Released on Dusk Fire Records this July (2008), Camden '70 (DUSKCD105) bears
testament to the potency of this gathering of modern British jazz talent of
the day in a debut record of a mid-tour concert at the Jeanetta Cochrane
Theatre during London's Camden Jazz Festival.
Colosseum and the NJO by now had played Croydon's Fairfield Hall, Birmingham
Town Hall, Lanchester Polytechnic and London's Queen Elizabeth Hall and were
going on to play Portsmouth and Brighton.
"It would have been pointless trying to ignore the Colosseum connection,
even if we'd wanted to so Dave Greenslade and Clem Clempson stayed on board
for this show, too,” reflects NJO member and now Observer jazz critic and
writer, Dave Gelly in the album's extensive booklet notes.
Between the NJO's first album, Western Reunion (Decca, 1965) and second, Le
Déjeuner sur l'Herbe (Verve, 1968), Neil Ardley's writing had matured to a
point where it was showing serious signs of outgrowing even the highly
flexible instrument that the orchestra had become. Under his guidance, the
band was now also playing new music by a whole crop of young composers -
Mike Taylor, Michael Garrick, Howard Riley and Michael Gibbs among them.
The line-up on this session was substantially the one that had recorded
Déjeuner, although there were a few significant absentees including Ian
Carr, who was by now touring the world with his pioneering jazz-rock band,
Nucleus.
The programme that night was essentially the orchestra's current concert set
and drew heavily on Le Déjeuner sur l‘Herbe, which was still current and
selling well. Of the eight numbers on the album, seven are included here
(tracks 5 to 11)
Camden '70 measures the extraordinary capabilities of a talent pool the like
of which was not to be seen again in a jazz orchestra. This release
(DUSKCD105) marks the recording's debut and, together with notes from Gelly
and sound engineer Martin Mitchell (on the master tapes restoration) and
period images, makes for a truly exciting addition to the jazz and jazz rock
aficionado's collection.
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NEIL ARDLEY'S NEW JAZZ ORCHESTRA
Camden '70
TRACK
LISTING:
1.Stratusfunk
2. Tanglewood
3. Shades Of Blue
4. Rope Laddet to the Moon
5. Dusk Fire
6. Naima
7. Nardis
8. Sturdy
9. Rebirth
10. Ballad
11. Le Dejeuner sur L'Herbe
12. National Anthm & Tango
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