Tag Archives: Fiona Mactaggart

Trio HLK with Evelyn Glennie

Concert Review: Trio HLK with Evelyn Glennie

Date: May 13, 2018
Venue: The Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, Scotland
Review by F. Mactaggart

Trio HLK with Evelyn Glennie

Photo by Adam Bulley

The sense of excitement is palpable as Scottish Trio HLK arrive briskly on stage at 8pm sharp, and persists undimmed until they take their modest final bows to the thrilled home crowd precisely two hours later. Such exactitude regarding time feels in keeping with a band whose music is predicated upon unrelenting changes particularly in time signature and tempo, a stuttering, gleeful symphony of polyrhythms and harmonic complexity.

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Tommy Smith

Concert Review: Spirit of light by Tommy Smith, featuring Kurt Elling

And the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra and Cappella Nova

Date: December 17, 2017
Venue: St Mary’s Cathedral, Edinburgh, Scotland

Review and photographs by Fiona Mactaggart

Rugged up against the bone-chilling cold in the Scottish capital’s visually and acoustically impressive St Mary’s Cathedral, the full-house audience seem aware they are in for something special. The two-part concert begins with a clear as ice spoken introduction from esteemed New York – based jazz singer and previous collaborator with Tommy Smith and the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra (SNJO), Kurt Elling. With appropriate gravitas, Elling explains that this concert will be “a modern meditation on the delirium that visits us at this season”, and that it would be no regular jazz gig.

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Simon Nabatov

Concert Review: Simon Nabatov Trio @ The Galway Jazz Fest (Ireland)

Date: October 8, 2017
Venue: Galway Jazz Festival (Ireland)

Review by Fiona Mactaggart (Photograph by sus)

An award for ‘friendliest festival’ might well go to the Galway Jazz Festival, this 4-day long event utilizing an eclectic range of venues and heaving with musical treasures. Tonight the venue is an up-market restaurant, the musical fare a veritable aural banquet offered by the new trio of pianist-extraordinaire, Simon Nabatov.

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Emil Brandqvist Trio

Emil Brandqvist Trio (Sweden) bringing a breath of Swedish fresh air to the Galway Jazz Festival

Venue: Black Gate Club at the Galway Jazz Festival (Eire)
Date: October 5th, 2017

Review by Fiona Mactaggart

The subdued lighting of the basement venue is well suited to this thoughtful and measured set, the small space only intensifying the calming effect of the delicate and beautiful melodies traced by pianist Tuomas A Turunen over a web spun by drummer and band leader, Emil Brandqvist.

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Moishe’s Bagel

Moishe’s Bagel: Acoustic Music From Scotland And Beyond

Date: August 24, 2017
Venue: The Queen’s Hall (UK/Edinburgh)

Review by  Fiona Mactaggart

In a relatively small city of less than half a million people, Edinburgh-based musicians not infrequently can find themselves playing in bands of mixed musical genres. Since 2003 Moishe’s Bagel, or “The Bagel” as they are affectionately known locally, are perhaps one of the most successful products of this fortuitous melding of musics, with four CD releases to date on the labels Eachday Music and Moishe’s Bagel, under their belts.

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