The final two concerts in the Parabola Arts Centre (PAC) that I wish to discuss present pianist/composer Nikki Yeoh with the National Youth Jazz Orchestra (NYJO) (Friday 3rd May at 9pm) and the Birmingham/Sienna/Hamburg Exchange (Saturday 4th May at 11am).
Nikki Yeoh is a wonderful pianist and composer; she was commissioned by the festival in 2009 to write a group that also featured saxophonist John Surman, and this year she returns with NYJO to present an expanded version of Speechmik X-ploration, a piece originally commissioned by the BBC and Bath Festival. It is a composition inspired by the amazing Brazilian composer Hermeto Pascoal and dedicated to global justice and equality; it is arranged around a poem that is repeated six times in six different languages. The concert will also feature Nucleus, a composition dedicated to the late trumpeter Ian Carr, who led the very influential Nucleus group and who taught Nikki as she started in jazz.
For more information and to book, see https://www.cheltenhamfestivals.com/jazz/whats-on/2024/nikki-yeoh-nyjo-present-speechmik-x-ploration
The Birmingham/Sienna/Hamburg Exchange involves students from the jazz courses in those cities working together to form small groups and present a short set from each group. The students from Sienna and Hamburg travel to Birmingham a few days before the festival where they meet the Birmingham students, and form mixed groups. They work together and prepare material for the Cheltenham concert and then travel down to Cheltenham for the gig. The Exchange has been going for many years and the PAC concert is one of the most popular in the Cheltenham programme; it started with Norwegian students on the jazz course in Trondheim and this lasted for nine years. Since then we had a year with students from Paris, but now the relationship with the courses in Sienna and Hamburg is well established. This concert is already almost sold out, so book now at https://www.cheltenhamfestivals.com/jazz/whats-on/2024/birmingham-conservatoire-and-siena-and-hamburg-exchange
TDE Promotions 