Archive for June, 2009

Southbank Centre has been buzzing this week with Ornette Coleman’s meltdown festival. It’s been amazing having all these jazz legends wandering the corridors of the building!

I was asked to create a support act for blues guitarist James Blood Ulmer. I wanted to take a look at Harmolodics, which is Ornette’s method for free improvisation. Nobody could tell me what it really means though, so I decided to recruit a quartet of unconventional vocalists who could handle anything that was thrown at them.

Shlo, Marcina, Cleveland and Bellatrix at the QEH

My recruits were jazz singer Cleveland Watkiss, world female beatbox champion Bellatrix, and Marcina Arnold, a vocalist who leaps from kathak to soul to jazz and beyond. The plan was to completely improvise the 30 minute set without discussing a thing.

In the soundcheck we started doing a quick improvisation for about 30 seconds. The groove we came up with sounded amazing so I decided to stop it there so that we wouldn’t give too much away to each other before the set. We then went to watch a short documentary about Ornette Coleman in the sixties, during one of his most out there crazy free jazz phases. The music was so intense, nothing the band were playing seemed to be connected to each other. I wasn’t sure if I was getting it, but it seemed to make sense to everyone so I kept quiet.

As soon as the film finished we walked out onstage and went for it. What came out of our mouths was nothing like what we’d done in the soundcheck. It was choppy and changing and hard to follow. Like Ornette’s crazy disconnected sound had infected us.

I walked away from the stage bewildered. Lots of people said they really enjoyed it, and I thought hey, how can you say you got it.. you must be faking that, because even I didn’t get it and I was the one performing it.

James Blood Ulmer

But maybe there was nothing to get.. you listen to the sound we made, and it means something different to each person who is listening to it.

ANYWAY… the next day I was back at Southbank because Mike Patton was performing an improvised set with Fred Frith and I wanted to meet up with him. He invited me to sit in on a couple of tracks which was incredible.

Me with Patton and Frith – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQMLcblw54E

Later on I had dinner with Robert Wyatt who was on the same bjork album as me.. he has real difficulty with performance now but has come out of retirement for one last gig. His hero is the legendary bassist Charlie Haden, who invited him to do a song at the Festival Hall. Robert said it would be the last time he ever performs in public, and it was moving to watch them perform together.

The evening finished with Patti Smith at the Festival Hall with Flea rocking out on bass. This place is on fire!

Mark Sainsbury's shot of the view of London skyline from Southbank

Meltdown is all over now, and festival season has officially started. this weekend is GLASTONBURY!!!

As part of Ornette Coleman’s Meltdown at Southbank Centre, Shlomo presents his “Beatbox Harmolodics” on Tuesday 16th June (tomorrow) featuring Cleveland Watkiss, Marcina Arnold and Bellatrix (Female World Beatbox Champion).

The specially formed vocal quartet will be exploring Harmolodics, Coleman’s method of free improvisation.

More info: http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/calendar/productions/james-blood-ulmer-47584

Went to Bristol on Friday to perform at the after-show party for the private view of Banksy’s new show. We tried out a new performance style which is being called ‘Africa Express Soundsystem’.

VV Brown and Shlo

Africa Express is Damon Albarn’s project where he gets African musicians to collaborate with western artists in a non-patronising way. I first took part in their event at Glastonbury in 2007 when I got to play one of my all time favourite songs ‘A Message To You’ with 2 of The Specials (terry and lynval, the first time they’d played together in 20 years!).

VV Brown and Miss Dynamite

The idea behind Africa Express Soundsystem is to get African and western musicians and DJs to jam together in more of a club setting. We’re doing it at Glasto this year in the middle of the Saturday night in Shangri La.

In Bristol we had Shy FX, MoDJ, Sam Duckworth (getcape), Bashy, Miss Dynamite, VV Brown and some others all jamming together. YAY!

We had a fantastic (sold out!) three-night run at Udderbelly, the upside down purple cow theatre venue that seats 400 people. It was so much fun.

Standing ovation!

We were trying out a new aspect to the Vocal Orchestra show, with a more theatrical style to it.. Over the next couple of years I’m planning to create a full theatre show, along the lines of something like Stomp, but using only the voice.

The Evening Standard described the show as ’slick theatrics’ which is amazing considering how little time we had to throw it together, with no budget whatsoever, just a lot of goodwill and talent! so big thanks to all who have been involved, and to those that came down to support. Cannot wait for phase 2!!!

Next stop GLASTO!

Shlo and Billy in front of the Cow