For the past two weeks, I've been listening to Jasmine Myra almost exclusively (at least, when I'm at my desk), and I'm now ready to offer comments about her music. I will be referring to this performance below as it's a fine document of a live performance; the only problems are that the first seven minutes contain nothing and there's also a fifteen minute break in the middle. I downloaded the performance then edited out the long waits. For some reason, the microphone into which JM speaks is at a very low volume so it is almost impossible to hear what she is saying; I increased the volume of these parts while I was editing the file.
The line up is JM - alto sax; Arran Kent – flute/bass clarinet; Matt Cliffe – flute/alto sax; Liam DeTar – guitar; Jasper Green – piano; Sam Quintana – double bass; Alice Roberts – harp; George Hall – drums. The last four appear to play with JM frequently over the years whereas the others are not so constant. Liam DeTar - an unfortunate name for a guitarist - is superfluous in this performance; his parts are minimal and can barely be heard. This is somewhat strange as on other videos of JM there is a different guitarist who often plays in tandem with JM.
Unfortunately, I have no idea of what most of the pieces are called. Probably my favourite is the one that starts after about 47 minutes in the unedited video and is the last piece before the break. This starts out as another tone poem with harp arpeggios in 3/4 time; after a few minutes there is a break for the clarinet and then the piece continues in 4/4. A theme is played then there's time for a wild bass clarinet solo before the ensemble comes back in for a stomping finale - although in fact, the piece peters out after the finale, a mistake in my opinion. The bass clarinet adds depth to the sound whilst not being another saxophone. This piece is supposed to be on the upcoming album to be released in May.
My other favourite and unnamed piece is the encore, another piece from the upcoming album. This is introduced as being a slightly silly song, although it is not clear to me why JM calls it this.
I would not like to be the harpist in this group as several songs depend on harp arpeggios played without break for a few minutes each time. I don't know whether this is normal for harp pieces but I imagine that it can get confusing.
I don't understand the economics of this group and how they manage to tour (at one point, JM says that this is the first night of her first tour); can you imagine taking a harp from venue to venue? It won't fit in the van and is also more delicate than a guitar. Matt Cliffe has a booking page that states than he can be booked from £180 a gig (and he's cheap compaired to some of the other names that appear on that page). Let's say that his fee is £200 a night, and if everyone charges the same amount, that's £1400 a night, not including travel and living expenses. Can an almost unknown musician charge £2000 for one gig?
| Title | Tags | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 463 | Sequencing "Lost" / 2 | Van der Graaf Generator, Peter Hammill, Home recording | |
| 688 | Boy, was I wrong - programming naivety | Programming, Delphi, ClientDataSet | |
| 1381 | A year of Covid-19 | Covid-19 | |
| 1592 | Goodbye, Dilbert (at least for the time being) | Personal, Covid-19 |
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