Terence Collie: DNA
London-based composer and bandleader, Terence Collie, taught himself to play piano at an early age. By the time he was 17 he was in a professional band in Jersey performing in the island’s hotels and nightclubs. By the late 80s / early 90s he was supporting artists such as Teddy Edwards, Georgie Fame and Andy Sheppard.
Collie returned to mainland UK in the 90s and recorded two albums in 2011 with his jazz-fusion quartet, Prison Break. Since then he’s released Reminiscent, a solo piano album in 2023; 384,400 with a new quartet in the same year and Elements in 2025 with bassist Nick Lenner-Webster, drummer Ted Carrasco and the London String Trio. His new release brings that string trio back, this time with his quartet, to explore identity and lineage through the lens of contemporary jazz.
The music, composed by Collie, traces his family heritage in the Seychelles. Montrose To Mahé is inspired by his great-grandfather who journeyed from Scotland to the Seychelles where he settled. Following a Scottish jig intro, the melody becomes strangely reminiscent of Ray Davies’ Waterloo Sunset. Good Genes celebrates Collie’s mixed background with its blend of jazz and Latin sparkle. Silhouette is named after a mysterious island in the Seychelles archipelago while Tall Palm Trees is inspired by a prehistoric palm found only on the island of Praslin.
Beau Vallon recalls the coastal area of Mahé where Collie’s maternal grandfather built his home. It’s followed by Harbour View, a lively fusion of jazz, blues and Creole groove named after his paternal grandparents’ guesthouse. La Digue is named after the third-largest island in the Seychelles and Bird Island, a bonus track on the CD, references the remote Seychelles island inhabited solely by nesting seabirds. These charismatic compositions comprise Collie’s most rhythmic and personally focused body of work to date.
Discography
Montrose To Mahé; Good Genes; Silhouette; Tall Palm Trees; Beau Vallon; Harbour View; La Digue; Bird Island (50.03)
Collie (p); Nick Lenner-Webster (b); Cosimo Keita Cadore (pc); Ted Carrasco (d); Ruth Elder (vn); Clare Kennington (vla); Jocasta Mudge (clo). Real World Studios, Box, UK, 2026.
Adhyâropa Records ÂRUK0005
Les Haricots Rouge: 60 Ans, Amazing Grace !!
French septet Les Haricots Rouges (the Red Beans) have delivered top-class New Orleans jazz for over six decades. Initially an octet, the band was formed by a group of students at a Paris high school in 1963. Their new album, translated as “60 Years, Amazing Grace!” celebrates the band’s enduring journey. Observant readers may have noted that they’ve actually been going for 63 years now. While the lineup has changed over time, the outfit’s original pianist, Pierre Jean, is still there.
The band has performed thousands of concerts world-wide and sold over a million albums. In the process they’ve opened for Louis Armstrong, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, played with the likes of Kid Thomas and George Lewis and jammed with Dizzy Gillespie and Fats Domino.
In their new release, five of the band’s seven members provide the vocals and three of its 11 tracks are penned by the band – Super Marché, Le Court Bouillon and Le Kid Est Mort. These are interweaved with seven classics including a French adaptation of Bartholomew & King’s Ma Madeleine and a rendition sung in English of Lionel Hampton’s I’m On My Way From You. The track Plus Je T’Embrasse employs Ben Ryan’s music from his 1926 song The Gang That Sang “Heart Of My Heart”, popularised by The Four Aces. The band’s French vocals in this instance bear no relation to the English lyrics. For a taste of Red Beans have a listen to their take on Rose & Owens’ Linger Awhile.
Discography
Super Marché; Amazing Grace; Plus Je T’Embrasse; Le Court Bouillon; Lead Me Saviour; I’m On My Way From You; Ma Madeleine; Amapola; Parfum Des Îles; Linger Awhile; Le Kid Est Mort (39.24)
Jean Dufour (t, v); Jacques Montebruno (cl); Christophe Deret (tb, v); Pierre Jean (p, v); Norbert Congrega (bj, v); Pierre Luc Puig (b); Michel Senamaud (d, v). Doix-lès-Fontaines, France, 8 April 2025.
Frémeaux & Associés FA8627
Bobby Sanabria Multiverse Big Band: Arsenio And Beyond – Live At The Bronx Music Hall
Puerto-Rican drummer & percussionist, Bobby Sanabria was raised in the South Bronx, New York City. Over the years he’s performed and recorded with such as Mario Bauzá, Tito Puente, Mongo Santamaria, Ray Barretto and Paquito D’Rivera. Sanabria established his 26-piece Multiverse Big Band 28 years ago.
The band’s latest release, Arsenio And Beyond, celebrates Arsenio Rodriguez (1911-1970), who invented the mambo and son montuno rhythms, the template for what became salsa. Blind from age seven, Rodriguez became a master of the Cuban tres, the mandolin-sounding guitar. He’s considered by many to be the most important figure in the history of Afro-Cuban dance music.
The album was recorded before a cheering audience at New York’s Bronx Music Hall, in the same neighbourhood where Rodriguez lived. It’s entitled Arsenio And Beyond because it includes music influenced by Rodriguez (Takao Heisho’s La Fruta and Puente’s Mambo Diablo) as well as seven compositions by Rodriguez himself.
Rodríguez’ songbook is reworked within the contemporary big-band setting with high-octane arrangements supervised by Sanabria. The result is fast-paced and frenetic, with a never-changing tempo. It takes no prisoners. If you like relentless drumming, loud, urgent vocals and trumpets at full tilt then this is for you.
Discography
Tumba Y Bongó; La Fruta; No Quiero; La Cartera; La Vida Es Un Sueño; Mambo Diablo; Mulato Rumbero; El Elemento Del Bronx; Yo Nací En África / Anabacoa (71.22)
See here for full list of musicians and other details. Bronx, New York, 15 March 2025.
Jazzheads JH1283
