Chichester label revives classic jazz album for full live performance

Craig Crane, of Chichester’s Analogue October Records, is reissuing it on his new record label on December 19. Craig has also arranged for the album to be played live in its entirety on Saturday, November 22 in Chichester’s Minerva Theatre by the Guildhall Jazz Orchestra – and then again on Sunday, November 23 at The Barbican, as part of the EFG London Jazz Festival. Both shows feature Binker Golding as the guest musician.

“It’s a huge moment for both the shop and the label and, I think, for Chichester too,” Craig said. “It’s not often something starts here and then heads to London!

“The genesis of this project was my decision to take a step back from the film industry. I ended up opening this shop in South Street in 2017 and then we all know what happened in 2020. We were told that we were not essential and we had to go into survival mode. But before the lockdown I had this crazy notion of wanting to set up a record label and to reissue records. Sadly that had to take a back seat during the pandemic but now I am on to my third record on this label.

“Kaleidoscope Of Rainbows was a significant album when it came out in the UK. It is a British jazz album and it has continuously since 1976 popped up on lists of the 100 albums that you should listen to before you die. It's an album that you can't listen to and say this sounds like the 1970s. It is as a fresh today as it was on the day it was recorded in 1976. As a jazz fan I'd always been aware of it, and I decided that once I got my first release out of the way my second release would be another Neil Ardley record which he brought out in 1979. And then I started to look at this one because it is just such a monumental album.

“I approached the rights holders and asked for the licence. He died in 2004 and I was going through the archive with the person that looks after the archive, Scott Stroman (professor of jazz at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama). I said to him how difficult did he think it would be to do a live performance of it to celebrate its 50th anniversary and to put it on at a venue like Chichester Festival Theatre. I expected 101 reasons why it was not possible but he looked at me and shrugged and said it would be really easy. That conversation didn't go away. We kept talking about it and I ended up at the Festival Theatre fixing it up. And so for some reason this little record shop in South Street is now putting on a show in the Minerva Theatre.”

The album was probably last performed live ten or 15 years ago, by the Guildhall: “This will be the first performance outside of London. We're doing Saturday night in Chichester and then we are at The Barbican on the Sunday for the London Jazz Festival. It is a deeply personal project for me. I never go at anything half baked. If I'm going to do something I feel obliged to take it right through to the end. It's such an important album. It is monumental. It is not what you would usually consider British jazz. People have memories of George Melly or Acker Bilk on Pebble Mill At One. This is not that. This is cutting edge. It is jazz. It is prog. This album in particular is a who's who of British jazz. It's an album that you can't label and an album that you can't define. It sits just as easily in the rock section as it will in the jazz section. It challenges people's perceptions of what is jazz.”

Tickets for the concert from Chichester Festival Theatre.