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When a 19-year-old, first-year student at Leeds College of Music wins the big band category of the Worshipful Company/Jazzorg 2009 Prize you can bet that 'precocious' is going to be somewhere in his background notes. But that's what James Beckwith did with his composition 'Date On Sunday'. From Saffron Walden, near Cambridge, James started the piano at quite a young age, but his interest in music really took off when he got involved with the Junior Jazz Course at the Royal Academy of Music, led by Nick Smart and Simon Colam. James played at Ronnie Scott’s and Pizza Express Jazz Club with the Royal Academy band and enjoyed the experience so much that music became an obvious career. His next step was studying piano and composition and he is currently under the tutelage of Mark Donlon, at Leeds. 'Date on Sunday’ is James’s first publishable big band composition, but he has worked on a number of arrangements of popular standards and tunes for big band by other artists. James plans to form his own big band at Leeds College of Music next year, working on some of his original compositions, compositions by other students, and some of these pieces that he has arranged. In the long term, James aspires to to play with some of the best jazz musicians in the country, to do a ‘post-grad’ course at a conservatoire in London and achieve more success with his writing. We think that you'll be hearing from him on all these fronts so stay in touch at his myspace site [here]
 James receiving his prize from Nigel Tully (Musician's Company) at the Ronnie's presentation with Frank Griffith looking on. Frank commented on James's piece:
'This is an extremely good piece with excellent orchestration bringing out the highly advanced harmonic sense, which is brought fully to the fore. The warm and subtle orchestration really highlights the rich harmonies contained within and the transitions between tempo and groove changes are seamless, allowing the listener to go with the change without interruption. This is a difficult skill to pull off but is handled deftly throughout the piece. The piano and guitar melodies throughout are refreshing and welcome as are the bass trombone, bari sax and guitar melodic figures at bars 54-78. I don't know who the date on Sunday is with but I can imagine that I'd like her.'
- Downloads
- Only 3 sample pages of James's composition (from the alto, trumpet and trombone parts) are displayed on your monitor and you can get a full pdf download of all the parts and a 'control score' by clicking [this link]
- A download of the full MP3 audio version of the composition, played by the Trinity College Jazz Ensemble, is also available by clicking
[this link]
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Band Personnel:
Leader: Malcolm Earle-Smith (tbn)
Reeds/Flutes: Lucas Dodd (alto), Max
Johnson (alto), Ben Mallinder (tenor), William Scott (tenor), Simon Marsh (baritone),
Trumpets/Flugels: Conor
Cantrell, Jack Coward, Jeffrey Brown, Jonathan Murray
Trombones: Adam Tyas, Eleanor Smith, Matthew
Benson
Tuba: Christopher Dennis
Rhythm and Percussion: Christopher Eldred (pno),
Matthew Redman (gtr), Fergus Ireland (bass), David Elliott (drms)
Harp:Tamara Young
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| 'Date On Sunday'
The Trinity College Jazz Ensemble perform 'Date On Sunday' at a concert at Ronnie Scott's club in January 2009, guided by their enthusiastic leader, Malcolm Earle-Smith.
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