ArtistInfo

David Panton Trio
For Some Cats

Album UK 2012 on Nondo label
Jazz (Avant-garde Jazz, Free Improvisation)

NONDO FMC5 DAVID PANTON TRIO FOR SOME CATS (cassette) Re-released as CD(R) disc and mp3 download 2012. Recorded at Bulldog Studios, East Dulwich, London on 15/16 January 1982 Remixed at Rob Lamb's Studio, Kings Heath, Birmingham All works by Panton published by D & ED Panton (Music) Some of these tracks were written with the help of a second Arts Council jazz bursary awarded to Panton in 1981, and also included in a BBC Jazz in Britiain broadcast aired in April 1982. Liner notes for re-release:CD/Download of NONDO FMC3 'For Some Cats' David Panton Trio This 2012 CD/download re-release of NONDO FMC3, For Some Cats, is slightly different from the original: it has of course been digitised from the reel-to-reel production master, but includes two extra tracks - a second take of Cool Minor and the short elegiac Adieu - plus a re-edit of Burnt Carrots. The original recording, at Bulldog Studios in south London on 15/16 January 1982, was not as problem free as would have been ideal, so some re-mixing was done at Bob Lamb’s Studio in Birmingham later that year, before the session was finally released on cassette. Some of the pieces were also recorded at the BBC Maida Vale Studios on 16 March 1982 for Radio Three’s Jazz In Britain programme, transmitted on 26 April 1982. The project was assisted by an Arts Council jazz bursary awarded the previous autumn. Where Are You Now?, Cool Minor and Bedtime for Cats begin and end with a standard 32 bar theme, solos can be taken as variations on it or as more open and extended melodic/harmonic development of it. Here they remain more or less within bounds. Lit, So You’re Back, You Don’t Have To…, and Revolutionary Study begin, but don’t necessarily end with, short often fragmentary melodic/rhythmic ideas (riffs) that then take off into more open improvisation - though here they are not over extended, as they would be in live performance. Burnt Carrots is a form of extended composition containing several different elements: verbal recitation, a 32-bar theme, a quasi New Orleans style funeral dirge, and two solo muted cornet cadenzas, one of which now ends the piece; while it is structured to accommodate these different elements it also allows space for the musicians to freely improvise. Adieu is a short piece of around two minutes, spontaneously improvised following the spontaneous lead of the alto. But these pieces don’t rely entirely on the technicalities of construction, in either the formal or improvisational sense; there is a more human side. Many of them are dedicated to specific individuals, or ‘cats’, others are more vaguely general - Where Are You Now? Lit and Bedtime for Cats fall into this latter category. So You’re Back was a get-well message for altoist Mike Osborne who continued to suffer ill health until his death in 2007, effectively depriving us, for a quarter of a century, of his unique and uncompromising approach to writing and playing jazz. You Don’t Have To… was written for an actual feline who had a habit of sitting underneath an open skylight meowing as though asking permission to go through it. The reply was always: ‘You can go if you want to, but you don’t have to…’ Revolutionary Study was written in mind of the struggle of Polish workers at the time, in defiance of their government. Burnt Carrots and Cool Minor were both written for Jef Daw, a musician and friend who died suddenly aged 40, while on holiday in Brittany; the former reflecting his eclectic musical humour as expressed in his work with ‘progressive’ band Tea & Symphony in the 1960s, and the latter his characteristic laid-back cool. At the end of the session John suggested we do a short spontaneous piece in mind of Jef’s untimely demise, which had been appended as a coda to Burnt Carrots on the original release. But here, Adieu returns as a final stand-alone tribute For Some Cats who are no longer with us - including John. DP

Musicians

	David Panton Trio , album by
	Nick Stephens eb, acoustic bass, electric bass, voice
	David Panton as, p, GB alto saxophone, clarinet, voice, liner notes, english
	John Stevens dr, perc, 1940-1994 GB drums, cornet, voice

ArtistInfo App

Acknowledgements

ArtistInfo for Mac, iPad, and iPhone