Huw Warren Quartet – Choro Choro Choro
Details
TIME: 8.00 – 11.00 pm
TICKETS: £14
PERSONNEL
Huw Warren – Piano
Tori Freestone – Flute
Conor Chaplin – Double Bass
Adriano Adewale – Drums
Described by BBC Music Magazine as ‘a European stylist of the highest order’, pianist and composer Huw Warren has, over the past 40 years, earned an international reputation as the creator of melodically beautiful and rhythmically distinctive compositions that unite the worlds of jazz, classical, world and avant-garde music. Warren has enjoyed a impressively varied career as a performer, recording artist, composer, arranger and teacher which has been recognised with the BBC Jazz Award for Innovation and an ACW Creative Wales Award.
Celebrating Choro, the vibrant beating heart of Brazilian music, Huw Warren’s latest project explores music from the 1880’s to the present day by composers such as Ernesto Nazareth, Chiquinha Gonzaga, Pixinguinha, and modern masters such as Guinga and Hermeto Pascoal. By turns virtuoso, lyrical, and always beautiful and elegant – Choro Choro Choro brings new twists on this great dance music. Coinciding with the new solo piano album of the same name this is truly “Music for the Head, Heart and Feet” .
Huw Warren has created several previous projects around the music of Brazil, including collaborations with Jovino Santos Neto; a critically acclaimed recording of Hermeto’s music (‘Hermeto+’) in 2009; a trio record for CAM Jazz ‘Everything in Between’ in 2019 and ‘Core Coracao’ from 2017 with Maria Pia de Vito, Gabriele Mirabassi, Roberto Taufic, and the legendary Chico Buarque.
Welsh pianist and composer Huw Warren has achieved an international reputation for innovative and eclectic music making, over a thirty year career. Equally at home crossing the often exclusive worlds of Jazz, World and Contemporary music; he has a distinctive and personal voice, and has collaborated with a huge variety of artists worldwide
Huw has recorded 2 albums for ECM (as Quercus with June Tabor and Iain Ballamy) and in 2018 released a solo piano recording Nocturnes and Visions. In 2019 he released 2 albums for Italian label CAM Jazz Everything in Between (with Dudley Phillips and Zoot Warren) and New Day (with Mark Lockheart). His previous albums and projects have included themes and source material as diverse as John Dowland, Plainchant and Hermeto Pascoal. In 2024, as well as releasing his solo piano recording ‘Choro Choro Choro’, Huw has also released ‘Calennig’ an album of Plygain arrangements with singer Angharad Jenkins.
His appearance with the famed Perfect Houseplants (alongside Mark Lockheart, Dudley Phillips & Martin France) at last year’s Swanage Jazz Festival was the stuff of legends. He has also performed and collaborated with luminaries such as Mark Feldman, Peter Herbert, Joanna Macgregor, Iain Ballamy, Kenny Wheeler, Jim Black, Theo Bleckmann, Neil Yates, Pamela Thorby, Mose Se Fan Fan, Mat Maneri and Thomas Strønen.
In addition to receiving many awards and writing for a whole range of orchestral and jazz ensembles, Huw is currently a jazz lecturer/tutor at the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama (RWCMD) and is also head of Jazz Ensembles at Cardiff University.
Choro Choro Choro features an international line up including a welcome return to the East Side of Anglo/Spanish flautist Tori Freestone and a East Side debut by Brazilian percussionist Adriano Adewale.
“Finally, a special word for Huw Warren’s solo interpretation of Hermeto’s Mente Clara (clear mind), whose emotive, sustained and lush harmonies, combined with pellucid runs, are delivered so affectingly. Words, on this occasion, cannot do it justice” – London Jazz News
“Apart from the joyful pleasure it created in abundance, this concert was a powerful argument for our learning to think and talk purely in terms of ‘music’ and ‘musicians’ rather than jazz or classical music or, indeed, Brazilian music….” – Glyn Pursglove
Tori Freestone
Saxophonist, flautist and Ivor Novello Award winning composer Tori Freestone has performed with Internationally renowned players from the world of jazz, folk and world music including world renowned Brazilian composer and multi instrumentalistHermeto Pascoal, Ingrid and Christine Jensen, Cleo Laine/Dankworth Band, world renowned Arabic vocalist Natacha Atlas, Yazz Ahmed, (featuring on her album Polyhymnia), Ivo Neame Quintet and Octet working alongside musicians including Iain Ballamy, Stan Sulzman, Jasper Hoiby, Jami Cullum, Andy Sheppard and Jason Yarde. She also currently plays with many large ensembles including the Nikki Iles Jazz Orchestra, Julian Siegel Jazz Orchestra, Zoe Rahman Octet and holds the tenor 1 chair in the London Jazz Orchestra.
As a bandleader she has featured at jazz clubs and festivals worldwide including Cuba, Reykjavik, Germany, Italy, Austria and Spain with recordings/interviews for Jazz FM, Radio 3, Radio 2, Radio Bremen (Germany), ORF (Austria National Radio) and Jazz Canarias (Spain).
She won an Ivor Novello Award for Jazz ensemble composition in 2022 for a track on the soon to be released duo album with pianist Alcyona Mick and her recent trio release was ‘Jazz Album of the Month’ in the Guadian 2019. Commissions include the 2014 EFG London Jazz Festival which was performed at the QEH supporting Henry Texier and she was shortlisted for the 2017 Arts Foundation Award for Jazz Composition and the Parliamentary Jazz Award for Jazz Instrumentalist of the Year 2017 plus awarded PRS funding and the Help Musician’s Transmission fund, Do it Differently and Record and Release Awards in 2020.
As an educator she has performed workshops for the Royal Academy of Music, the Royal Welsh College of Music, Birmingham Conservatoire, Leeds Conservatoire, Kingston University, Falmouth University and Truro College, and has lectured at the Royal Academy of Music, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Middlesex University and Trinity Laban. She is currently Professor in Jazz Performance and Jazz composition at Leeds Conservatoire, visiting lecturer at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and tutors for the National Youth Jazz Collective alongside some of the UK’s finest musicians including Soweto Kinch, Norma Winstone
“Freestone has clearly listened widely, but her musicality and broad experiences have stirred all that input into an imposingly original sound” – John Fordham, The Guardian 4 * review
Brazilian percussionist/composer Adriano Adewale is a versatile musician and performer, known for his unconventional and exploratory approach to music, and for his ability to create magical soundscapes from the seemingly banal.
With an intriguing array of worldwide percussion instruments as well as his unique vocal percussion skills, Adriano has nurtured a sound world of his own. Adewale has an unique ability to play and create mesmerising atmospheres and soundscapes; he paints with sounds, telling stories through music. His percussion playing is creative and innovative, revealing beauty with subtle touch, combined with deep and powerfully crafted infectious grooves. The poetry created by Adewale’s heartfelt, thoughtful drumming in addition to a masterful delivery of his artwork, has captivated and mesmerised audiences from around the world.
Adriano has released several critical acclaim albums with his own international ensemble the ‘Adriano Adewale Group’, as well as in collaboration with Benjamim Taubkin, Nathan Riki Thomson, Emilia Marttenson to mention but a few. He has shared the stage with world leading artists including Bobby McFerrin, Joanna McGregor, Benjamin Taubkin.
Adriano has also made a name for himself as curator, an artistic director and a sought-after composer who works with cross-genre art forms. He writes and arranges music for small to large ensembles, youth choirs and orchestras. Adewale’s music connects musicians, communities and audiences from different backgrounds to come together as a team. Amongst others, Adriano has been commissioned by London Jazz Festival, Bath Music festival, Royal Opera House (London), Theatre Rites and Phoenix Dance Company
Regular visitor to the East Side Conor Chaplin completes the quartet on bass