Here’s an excellent preview by Jon Turney for the London Jazz Blog of the forthcoming London premiere on 17 November of the Nu Civilisation Orchestra‘s outstanding programme, Parallel: A Tribute To Joe Harriott – Where Music Meets Art at the Purcell Room, SouthbankCentre, home of Tomorrow’s Warriors and the Nu Civilisation Orchestra. We’ll also be displaying the art of the wonderful artist, Emma Godebska as part of the show.

Originally commissioned by the Lively Up! Festival to mark 50 Years of Jamaican Independence, Parallel is presented here as part of the London Jazz Festival.

Turney describes this concert as ‘well worth the effort’ and ‘exactly the kind of thing jazz festivals are about’. See video excerpts from the concert in Bristol here.

Meantime, here’s the preview of the show:

Zeitgeist moves in mysterious ways. Science sees more simultaneous discoveries than can be easily explained. Music, too, finds players striving for similar goals even though they haven’t discussed them.

The titles of the coruscating Jamaican alto saxophonist Joe Harriott’s key recordings, Free Form (1960) and Abstract (1962) declared his determination to get beyond be-bop to something freer from ready-made structure. Read on…