For one reason or another I haven’t been able to update my website for ages, but now I’m finally back online so I hope to keep it updated a bit more often.

First thing to tell you about is Harmonic, a fantastic festival that ran in March this year which I had a hand in organising. Full details of the festival can be found on the Harmonic website as well as recordings of some of the bands and some great photos courtesy of Kate Beatty. We had some fantastic bands playing including a very special commission involving New York based Claudia Quintet with local musicians Percy Pursglove and Steve Tromans. We’ll definitely be running Harmonic again in the future so stay tuned for news.

I started a new project for Harmonic called Gambol. The band is me on bass, Sam Wooster on trumpet, Lluis Mather on sax, Dan Nicholls on keys and Jim Bashford on drums with music written by me. The music is based on my experiences of living in Birmingham for the last ten years. It’s been really nice to explore new material with a new group of musicians and I’m really looking forward to doing more gigs with the band (we had our third gig last night which was fantastic). To give you an idea of the music, head over to the Harmonic website and check out the Media page for a recording of our set there with Rob Norman on keys. There’s also great recordings of some of the other bands who played there too.

Finally, a couple of gigs coming up to mention. I’m playing with the great Paul Dunmall, Paul Hession and Mike Hurley at The Yardbird on the 23rd September and I’m really looking forward to it. Also, Steve Tromans has written some new music for a project called Musickosmos which will be premiered at Rush Hour Blues in Symphony Hall on 8th October at 5.30pm so come along. Especially as it’s free entry!

Tags: chris mapp, Claudia Quintet, Gambol, Harmonic, Mike Hurley, Paul Dunmall, Paul Hession, Steve Tromans