Aziza
@ the Cadogan Hall
16 November 2022
Click an image to enlarge.
Musicians: Dave Holland - bass, Chris Potter
- saxophone,
Lionel Loueke - guitar, Eric Harland - drums
Biography
The remarkable rate at which Holland leads
or collaborates his way into fresh and exciting projects proves
he has no plans to diminish the range nor frequency of his creative
drive. His band line-ups reveal that his ear is still to the ground,
listening for and recognising fresh and deserving talent, and that
many are the musicians who are happy to perform or record with him.
As Holland prepares to celebrate his 70th year, he is currently
playing with a new group, the Aziza quartet, co-founded with Harland,
saxophonist Chris Potter, and guitarist Lionel Loueke.
Since Holland’s professional debut in the
mid 1960s, that voice has been heard in a remarkable number of different
contexts. From the electric whirlwind of Miles Davis’ “Bitches
Brew” era band to the elegant flamenco of his collaboration
with Spanish guitar legend Pepe Habichuela; accompanying the great
vocalist Betty Carter in her last years to forging a new sound with
the pioneering avant-garde quartet Circle alongside Chick Corea,
Anthony Braxton, and Barry Altschul; standing alongside legends
like Stan Getz, Hank Jones, Roy Haynes, and Sam Rivers to providing
early opportunities to now-leading players like Chris Potter, Kevin
and Robin Eubanks, or Steve Coleman; Dave Holland has been at the
forefront of jazz in many of its forms since his earliest days.
In 2013, Holland celebrated 40 years as a leader
in trademark fashion, by looking decidedly forward. On the anniversary
of his first release, “Conference of the Birds,” which
featured Rivers, Braxton and Altschul, Holland unveiled his latest
quartet, Prism, a visceral electric band featuring his longtime
collaborator Kevin Eubanks along with keyboardist Craig Taborn and
drummer Eric Harland.
In addition to Prism, Holland continues to lead
his Grammy-winning big band; his acclaimed quintet with saxophonist
Chris Potter, trombonist Robin Eubanks, vibraphonist Steve Nelson,
and drummer Nate Smith; and the Overtone quartet, with Potter, Harland,
and pianist Jason Moran. In recent years Holland has been performing
in a duo context with pianist Kenny Barron and with flamenco legend
Pepe Habichuela; a follow up to “Hands,” his 2010 recording
with Habichuela, is due in the fall of 2013. And he continues to
explore his solo voice, as documented on the albums “Emerald
Tears” (1977), “Ones All” (1993), and “Life
Cycle” (1982), a solo cello recording.
Since 2005, Holland’s output has been released
on his own Dare2 Records label, founded so that the bassist could
exercise greater control over the recording and release of his music.
The move came on the heels of a fruitful relationship with ECM Records
that had lasted for more than three decades. Attentive to devising
a one-of-the-kind packaging to match the product within, Holland
drafted world-famous graphic designer Niklaus Troxler to craft the
label’s distinctively bold and colourful look.
Born in Wolverhampton, England in 1946, Holland
shifted seamlessly between jazz traditions from the beginning. While
still in his native country, he collaborated with forward-thinking
peers like saxophonists Jon Surman and Evan Parker and pianists
Chris McGregor and John Taylor while also playing with more traditional
forebears from an earlier generational, such as saxophonists Tubby
Hayes and Ronnie Scott. It was while playing at Scott’s storied
Soho jazz club in 1968 that Holland was spotted by Miles Davis,
who immediately hired the young bassist for his ground-breaking
electric ensemble.
Over the next two years, Holland would appear on
Davis’ landmark recordings “Filles de Kilimanjaro,”
“In a Silent Way” and “Bitches Brew,” and
meet many of the artists with whom he would continue to revolutionize
modern jazz. They include such renowned names as Chick Corea, with
whom he co-founded the short-lived but influential quartet Circle;
Jack DeJohnette, a frequent rhythm section partner during Holland’s
ECM years and co-leader of the collective Gateway trio with Holland
and guitarist John Abercrombie; and Herbie Hancock, with whom Holland
would reunite in the mid-90s and record such genre-defying albums
as “The New Standard” and 2008 Grammy Album of the Year
award winner “River: The Joni Letters.”
After leaving Davis’ group, Holland embarked
on his solo career with the release of “Conference of the
Birds” in 1973, marking the beginning of several key relationships:
with ECM, with Braxton, and with Sam Rivers. At the same time, he
was a prolific sideman both in the jazz world and without, where
he recorded with rock and folk musicians including Bonnie Raitt,
John Hartford, and bluegrass legend Vassar Clements.
The 1980s saw the formation of Holland’s
first working quintet, featuring alto saxophonist Steve Coleman,
trumpeter Kenny Wheeler, and trombonist Julian Priester, which would
gradually transform into the quartet with Coleman, drummer Marvin
“Smitty” Smith, and Kevin Eubanks that recorded “Extensions”
in 1988 – the only one of Holland’s recordings to include
future Tonight Show bandleader prior to their reunion in Prism.
The foundations for most of the groups that Holland
currently leads were laid in the 1990s, when he founded his current
quintet and his much-acclaimed big band. The latter won two Grammy
awards in the Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album category, for its debut,
“What Goes Around,” in 2002 and for its follow-up, 2005’s
“Overtime,” both on “Dare2.” A third Grammy
came in 1999 in the Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Individual
or Group category, for the all-star quintet record “Like Minds”
(Concord), with Gary Burton, Chick Corea, Pat Metheny, and Roy Haynes.
A Fellow of the Guildhall School of Music &
Drama in London, where he studied from 1965-68, Holland has received
honorary doctorates from Birmingham Conservatoire in England and
both Boston’s Berklee College of Music and New England Conservatory,
where he has been a visiting artist in residence since 2005. He
served as artistic director for the Banff Centre Jazz Workshop in
Alberta, Canada for seven years in the 1980s and is currently an
artist in residence at the Royal Academy of Music and the University
of Miami.
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