On a journey from the almost Utopian freedom of our music to the established orthodox music school I met Joseph Eger who was travelling in the opposite direction.

Since that meeting we have on various occasions been catalysts in combingin together the music from our different backgrounds forming sometimes a fusion, and other times a healthy conflict between the orchestra, representing possibly the establishment, and the trio, representing the non-establishment; ourselves having complete trust in a rebellious spirit and highly developed, broad minded, music brain whose reformed ideas in direction have been frowned upon, almost spat upon by some so-called music critics. That being Joseph Eger, the fighter.

One such concert was at the Fairfield Hall on 17th October from which most of the recordings on this album were taken.

Five Bridges Suite

This was a commissioned work for the Newcastle Arts Festival. Lee Jackson's words set the scene and sum up one guy's memories and thoughts of his birth place, the result being a statement not an answer.

1st Movement. Fantasia. Uses bridges as a musical symbol. I worked on building a musical bridge combining early baroque forms to more contemporary ideas allowing the progression to move rather neurotically through a fantasia form.

2nd Movement. The second bridge was put together by using symphonic type vehicles around various rock rhythms and improvisations. The main exposition being stated in differing contexts.

3rd Movement. Chorale. The third bridge is a chorale interspersed with improvisations around the changes.

4th Movement. The High Level Fugue. I was inspired to write the fugue when I heard Friedrich Gulda's 'Prelude and Fugue' in which sticking to Bach's formula he wrote his own using Jazz phrasings. High level fugue has the same conception as this only I have endeavoured to not only use jazz phrasings but boogie-woogie techniques as well; as used by Meade Lux Lewis and Jimmy Yancey.

The natives of Newcastle will know that their high level bridge supports on the upper level the trains, and on the lower level the cars. having seen this bridge it suggested to me, as it did Lee and Brian, a certain mechanical counterpoint which when expressed musically let me divide the trains and cars between my right and left hands. Brian states a third counterpoint percussively using cymbals, simulating the splashing water of the River Tyne which becomes more and more polluted as 'progress' destroys nature herself by building more and more machines.

The final bridge is basically the second which I scored for a quintet of saxes and brass involving Alan Skidmore, Kenny Wheeler, John Warren, Pete King and Joe Harriott. We used the main riff as a spring-board for Chris Pyne (trombone).

In conclusion to all this The Nice and Joseph Eger have been trying to build bridges to those musical shores which seem determined to remain apart from that which is a whole.