Beats & Pieces Big Band » Ben

remix number three

Ben — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 10:08:05 +0000

It gives me enormous pleasure to present to you the third (and final… for now!) in the series of Beats & Pieces remixes, and its one I’ve been looking forward to sharing since it arrived in my inbox a few weeks ago. Rodrigo Constanzo has completely reworked ‘broken’ and it sounds awesome, a fitting end to three weeks of exciting remixes – hope you’ve enjoyed them as much as we have! If you missed the previous weeks’ remixes you can download them all in a single zip file here.

As with the other remixes, its been made available to download for free, but if you enjoy it we’d appreciate it if you considered making a donation to support our work by clicking the big yellow ‘Donate’ button on the right hand side of the Efpi site – ta!

jazz on 3

Ben — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 11:46:52 +0000

I was lucky enough last night to attend the live broadcast of BBC Jazz on 3 from Band on the Wall in Manchester, featuring live sets from Arun Ghosh, Stuart McCallum and Simcock/Walker/Swallow/Nussbaum (pictured below). Jez also played a few tracks from artists performing at this year’s Manchester Jazz Festival including a track of ours which was really exciting! Listen again for the next 7 days here – the Simcock/Walker/Swallow/Nussbaum set in particular is awesome… I’m just heading into the RNCM now as I’m working for their gig there tonight, can’t wait!

remix number two

Ben — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 10:54:35 +0000

The second in the series of Beats & Pieces remixes is now available to download over on the Efpi website; this week its ‘bake’ that’s been reworked by Dileu (aka Owain Roberts, aka Messner). Many will know that Owain also plays trombone on the EP, so its been really interesting to hear what he’s done with the track!

Again its been made available for you to download for free, but if you enjoy it please consider making a donation to support out work by clicking the big yellow ‘Donate’ button on the right hand side of the Efpi site – ta!

ep sold out!

Ben — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 16:12:41 +0000

I thought we’d sold out of the limited edition run of 100 numbered handmade copies a few weeks ago, then I found a couple more in a box in my house… But they’re now sold too so we’ve definitely completely sold out and it is no longer possible to purchase one (as far as I know)!

Obviously this is very exciting, thanks to everyone who’s bought one. If you missed out never fear as we’re currently preparing a reissue of the EP, not handpainted this time so slightly less exclusive but no less pretty to look at, we promise. Keep an eye out for when they’ll be available.

polar bear @ marlborough

Ben — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 11:13:38 +0000

Thanks to everyone who came to see us last week at the Marlborough jazz festival – apologies again for the slightly delayed start, circumstances out of my control! We really enjoyed the gig though, and hanging around at the festival afterwards as well. Continuing the recent theme of posting videos of gigs I’ve been to, here’s a track from Polar Bear’s set – ‘Happy For You’, one of my favourite tracks from their latest album (which is possibly my favourite album of theirs too!):

Also here’s a nice picture of Sam and Anton taking a quick paddle in the river with the ducks, isn’t that nice…

Beats & Pieces EP remixed

Ben — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 22:31:09 +0000

In the run up to our gig at the Manchester Jazz Festival on Saturday July 31st, and to celebrate both the end of our first UK tour and the 2nd anniversary of our first ever gig at the 2008 festival, we invited some close friends of Efpi to have a go at remixing some of the EP tracks. We’re chuffed with how they’ve turned out, its really exciting for us and we can’t wait for you to hear them!

The first remix (of ‘broken’ by Tullis Rennie) is available to download over at the Efpi Records site, and another remix will be made available each week until the mjf gig. As always, we’ve made the music available for free but if you enjoy it please consider making a donation to support both Beats & Pieces and the Efpi label – there’s a big yellow ‘Donate’ button at the side of every page on the Efpi site.

Thanks again to all the guys for their efforts in remixing, its been a really exciting process!

Go download! Let us know what you think…

newsletter 004

Ben — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 11:32:09 +0000

This was sent out to all our subscribers (sign up now!) last week ahead of our gig at the Bridgewater Hall but I’ve only now remembered to put it up here as well – very sorry… But they say that absence makes the heart grow fonder so you all must be really fond of it by now! Read it here.

space is the place

Ben — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 17:47:49 +0000

I went down to Birmingham on Saturday for the Mostly Jazz festival, which was a really great event – highlights of the day were Led Bib, Polar Bear and headliners the Sun Ra Arkestra. Thought I’d put up some of the pictures and video I took of the Arkestra’s set, it was awesome…(video bit shaky in places as I was dancing, sorry!)

The Arkestra are at Cafe Oto in London tonight and tomorrow (5th and 6th) so if you’re in the big smoke make sure you’re there!

mjf is coming…

Ben — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 08:51:05 +0000

Excited about the Manchester Jazz Festival next month! Check out the youtube video above for a preview of what the festival is about, and keep an eye on the website at manchesterjazz.com in the next few days as the full lineup will be revealed very soon. Pleased to officially announce that we’ll be playing on the closing night of the festival on Saturday 31st July at the festival pavilion in Albert Square – this will be a bit of a party for us too as it will officially end our tour, back at the scene of our first ever gig at the festival only two years ago… See you there!

frolics in south wales

Ben — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 19:16:50 +0000

Probably should have posted this a bit sooner (sorry…) but wanted to write to say what an amazing time we had in South Wales last Tuesday and Wednesday! Thanks to Alistair and the team at Dempseys in Cardiff and to Dave and everyone at Swansea Jazzland for having us, we really enjoyed ourselves and hope you and the audience did too – hopefully be back soon…

We spent the day in between the two gigs camping and hanging out in the countryside outside Carmarthen at Sam Andreae’s uncle’s amazing house (thanks again for hosting us Mike & Celia!), complete with ping-pong, pool, darts, bbq, campfire and lake – equipped with rowing boat and kayak. Hopefully more photos of our exploits to come, but these videos of Sam Healey (saxophone) and Paul Strachan (bass trombone) attempting to get to grips with the kayak should give you some idea of what we got up to!

Once again, cheers to everyone we met – can’t wait til we come back!