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Chris Conway - 4am
 



1
The Missing Years
2
Ellergarth Days
3
Skies Were Clear
4
Returning To The Sea
5
Life
6
Hours After Hours
7
Spellbinding
8
Emerald Light
9
And Suddenly It's Evening
10
Never One Day
11
Chasing Rainbows
12
Summer Rain
13
A World Apart - 4am



Chris Conway -
piano, acoustic & electric 10 string guitars, keyboards, electronic drums, percussion, bamboo flute, samples,
kalimba, zither, voice, recorder, bombarde
Steve Cooke - bass 3
Chris English -
acoustic & electric violin - 3, 8
Dave Everitt -
bass - 10
Nick Hislam -
soprano saxophone - 9, 13
Dave Hunt - snare drum - 10
Steve Lee -
bass - 2, 12
Andy Nicholls -
tenor saxophone - 1, 11
Anne Parker
-
cello - 4, 8
Carl Peberdy
- tabla, kalimba, perc., zither - 1, 12
Renuka Russell
-
shakuhachi - 12
Blackbird
-
voice - 13





 


Chris Conway

Atmospheric jazz, world music and electronics. Remastered from the cassette master, Chris Conway's debut album is full to the brim with ideas and creative energy. Featuring a remarkable selection of musicians, including a blackbird that used to sing outside his house at 4am.

background
I laid grand plans for my solo album in the spring of 1990. I called up a lot of musicians - mostly friends from my jazz bands or from The Rain Garden band extended family. I also experimented with electronics, live sequencing and even electronic jazz drums which sounded cool at the time. There were some very ambitious arrangements and listening now I can sense the charged energy of these sessions.

Jazz, elaborate pastoral works, minimal organ pieces and electronic adventures all can be found here. Atmosphere with a capital A was the holy grail of the time. A permanent twilight magical world - that was the kind of bubble I dreamed of and tried to create.

There was a lot of influences from ECM artists like Rainer Bruninghaus and Ralph Towner, plus Terry Riley and on And Suddenly It's Evening a complete homage to Terje Rypdal.

Heady days - amazing to think it was all done on a 4 track recorder.



influences
Steve Kuhn, Terry Riley, Ralph Towner, Rainer Bruninghaus, Palle Mikkelborg, Terje Rypdal, Bobo Stenson, ECM, Oregon, Collin Walcott, The Rain Garden


trivia
The Missing Years - is still in my duo jazz set with Andy Nicholls jazz. The theme turns up in 3/4 time as part of on You'll Never Know on the the CCs Happy Landings album Think Blue Count Two.

Ellergarth was the name of bassist Steve Lee's house where we played a lot of music in our schooldays.

Never One Day appears solo on the Sanctuary album as One Day Never

Chasing Rainbows developed into a song and can be heard on Chris Conway's Sounds Like Rain album.

The blackbird on A World Apart - 4am used to sing outside my house at 4am. So I set up the microphones outside my door and recorded live with the Blackbird, adding Nick Hislam's sax afterwards.

Drummer Dave Hunt passed aweay some years ago - this re-release is dedicated to his memory.

And Suddenly It's Evening is a quote from Salvatore Quasimodo's poem of the same name.

CC's fave track - A World Apart - 4am


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..... Chris Conway CD 4am