Barry Guy

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Barry Guy
Barry Guy Unterfahrt 2011-01-27-005.jpg
Barry Guy (2011)
Background information
Born (1947-04-22) 22 April 1947 (age 77)
OriginLondon, UK
Genres Free improvisation, free jazz, early music, classical music, contemporary classical
Occupation(s)Musician, composer
Instrument
Years active1969–present

Barry John Guy (born 22 April 1947, in London) [1] is an English composer and double bass player. His range of interests encompasses early music, contemporary composition, jazz and improvisation, and he has worked with a wide variety of orchestras in the UK and Europe. He studied at the Guildhall School of Music under Buxton Orr, and later taught there. [2]

Contents

Guy came to the fore as an improvising bassist as a member of a trio with pianist Howard Riley and drummer Tony Oxley (Witherden, 1969). He also became an occasional member of John Stevens' ensembles in the 1960s and 1970s, including the Spontaneous Music Ensemble. In the early 1970s, he was a member of the influential free improvisation group Iskra 1903 with Derek Bailey and trombonist Paul Rutherford (a project revived in the late 1970s, with violinist Philipp Wachsmann replacing Bailey). He also formed a long-standing partnership with saxophonist Evan Parker, which led to a trio with drummer Paul Lytton which became one of the best-known and most widely travelled free-improvising groups of the 1980s and 1990s. He was briefly a member of the Michael Nyman Band in the 1980s, performing on the soundtrack of The Draughtsman's Contract . [1]

Career

London Jazz Composers' Orchestra

Guy's interests in improvisation and formal composition received their grandest form in the London Jazz Composers' Orchestra. Originally formed to perform Guy's composition Ode in 1972 (released as a 2-LP set on Incus and later, in expanded form, as a 2-CD set on Intakt), it became one of the great large-scale European improvising ensembles. [1] Early documentation is spotty – the only other recording from its early years is Stringer (FMP, now available on Intakt paired with the later "Study II") – but, beginning in the late 1980s, the Swiss label Intakt set out to document the band more thoroughly. The result was a series of ambitious, album-length compositions designed to give all the players in the band maximum opportunity for expression, while still preserving a rigorous sense of form: Zurich Concerts (with Anthony Braxton), Harmos , Double Trouble (originally written for an encounter with Alexander von Schlippenbach's Globe Unity Orchestra, though the eventual CD was just for the LJCO), Theoria (a concerto for guest pianist Irène Schweizer), Portraits (a 2-CD set of musical portraits of the band members and their internal groupings), Three Pieces, and Double Trouble Two . The group's activities subsided in the mid-1990s, but it was never formally disbanded, and reconvened in 2008 for a one-off concert in Switzerland. In the mid-1990s Guy also created a second, smaller ensemble, the Barry Guy New Orchestra. [2]

Other activities

Guy has also written for other large improvising ensembles, such as the NOW Orchestra and ROVA (the piece Witch Gong Game inspired by images by the visual artist Alan Davie).

His current improvising activities include piano trios with Marilyn Crispell and Agusti Fernandez. He has also recorded several albums for ECM, which often focus on the interface between improvisers and electronics, including his work in Evan Parker's Electro-Acoustic Ensemble and his own Ceremony.

Guy's session work in the pop field includes playing double bass on the song "Nightporter", from the Japan album Gentlemen Take Polaroids .

He is married to the early music violinist Maya Homburger. After spending some years in Ireland, they now live in Switzerland. They run the small label Maya, which releases a variety of records in the genres of free improvisation, baroque music and contemporary composition.

In 2016, Guy was appointed Honorary Professor at the Rhythmic Music Conservatory (RMC) in Copenhagen, Denmark, where he periodically conducts workshops and master classes. [3]

Style

Guy's jazz work is characterised by free improvisation, using a range of unusual playing methods: bowed and pizzicato sounds beneath the bass's bridge; plucking the strings above the left hand; beating the strings with percussion instrument mallets; and "preparing" the instrument with sticks and other implements inserted between the strings and fingerboard. His improvisations are often percussive and unpredictable, inhabiting no discernible harmonic territory and pushing into unknown regions. However, they can also be melodious and tender with due regard for harmonic integration with other players, and at times he will even play with a straight jazz swing feel.

Similarly, in his concert works, Guy manages to alternate harmonic and rhythmic complexity worthy of 1960s experimentalists such as Penderecki and Stockhausen with joyous, often ecstatic, melody. Works such as "Flagwalk" for string orchestra and "Fallingwater – Concerto for Orchestra" display Guy's compositional skill in handling extended forms and writing for large instrumental groups.

Some of his compositions, such as "Witch Gong Game" for ensemble, use graphic notation in conjunction with cue cards to lead performers into playing and improvising material from numbered sections of the score.

He is also an architect.

Concert works

Orchestra

Large ensemble (seven or more players)

Soloists and large ensemble (seven or more players)

Works for 2–6 Players

Solo works (excluding keyboard)

Solo voices and up to six players

Music for film or television

Electroacoustic works

These works are published by Chester Novello, UK, and further information may be found on their Barry Guy page. [4]

Recordings

Solo

With John Stevens and Trevor Watts

With Howard Riley

With Bob Downes Open Music

With Tony Oxley

With Iskra 1903

With Iskra 1912

With Barre Phillips

With London Jazz Composers' Orchestra

With the Barry Guy New Orchestra

With Evan Parker

With Mats Gustafsson

With Marilyn Crispell

With Maya Homburger

With others

Bibliography

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<i>Iskra 1903</i> 1972 studio album live by Paul Rutherford, Derek Bailey and Barry Guy

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<i>Harmos</i> 1989 studio album by Barry Guy and the London Jazz Composers Orchestra

Harmos is an album by Barry Guy and the London Jazz Composers' Orchestra that features a recording of a large-scale, 44-minute composition by Guy. It was recorded in April 1989, just before the LJCO's 20th anniversary, in Zürich, Switzerland, and was released later that year by Intakt Records. Guy interpreted the Greek title in its original meaning of "coming together," and the work attempts to find solutions to the challenges surrounding the coexistence of improvisation and composition.

<i>Double Trouble</i> (Barry Guy and the London Jazz Composers Orchestra album) 1990 studio album by Barry Guy and the London Jazz Composers Orchestra

Double Trouble is an album by Barry Guy and the London Jazz Composers' Orchestra. Documenting a large-scale, 46-minute composition by Guy, it was recorded in April 1989 in Zürich, Switzerland, and was released in 1990 by Intakt Records.

<i>Double Trouble Two</i> 1998 studio album by Barry Guy

Double Trouble Two is an album by Barry Guy and the London Jazz Composers' Orchestra with guest artists Irène Schweizer (piano), Marilyn Crispell (piano), and Pierre Favre (drums). Documenting a large-scale, 47-minute composition by Guy, it was recorded in December 1995 in Zürich, Switzerland, and was released in 1998 by Intakt Records.

<i>Zurich Concerts</i> 1988 live album by Barry Guy and the London Jazz Composers Orchestra with Anthony Braxton

Zurich Concerts is a double live album by Barry Guy and the London Jazz Composers' Orchestra featuring recordings of two large-scale compositions, one by Guy, the other by guest artist Anthony Braxton. The Guy work was recorded on November 11, 1987, at Rote Fabrik in Zürich, while the Braxton work was recorded on March 27, 1988, at the same location. The album was initially released on LP in 1988 by Intakt Records, and was reissued on CD in 1995.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Colin Larkin, ed. (1992). The Guinness Who's Who of Jazz (First ed.). Guinness Publishing. p. 177. ISBN   0-85112-580-8.
  2. 1 2 Duncan Heining. And Did Those Feet … Six British Jazz Composers (2023)
  3. ↑ "RMC appoints Barry Guy". Rmc.dk. Retrieved 5 September 2017.
  4. ↑ "Home - Wise Music Classical". Wisemusicclassical.com. Retrieved 26 March 2020.
  5. ↑ "JAPO 60003". Trovar.com. Archived from the original on 1 November 2017. Retrieved 26 March 2020.
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