LAURA JUDD & PAUL DUNMALL – FANFARES & FREEDOM (2024) (Discus Music/ Bandcamp)

This is live recording from a piece premiered at the 2023 Cheltenham Jazz Festival, and later recorded at The Vortex Club in London. Laura Jurd was commissioned to write this piece for scored ensemble plus improvising quartet. The unconventional and ‘on the edge’ experimental tenor saxophonist Paul Dunmall is quickly to the fore on ‘Opening Out’ to Miles Levin’s clattering drums, before a strong melody repeated by various brass instruments including tuba and Laura Judd’s trumpet (who presumably plays the solo – there is another trumpeter in Chris Batchelor), returns. Oren Marshall’s tuba opens the second piece, the 13 minute long ‘Onward Stomp’ with Liam Noble’s free form piano; around four minutes an excellent passage of ensemble jazz appears, sounding for all the world like baying elephants at one point, and I mean that in a nice way, before Dunmall embarks on some mazy runs; just after seven minutes it all quietens down ago as the tuba and an exquisitely sensitive trumpet exchange licks. There is much more to come over the 45 minutes, and if you are into improvised jazz with a melodic core, or even if you are not, this would be a good introduction.