A message from Martin Archer: Saturday at Marsden Jazz Festival

Head to www.marsdenjazzfestival.com to buy your festival pass and find out more!

Taking the electric music of Miles Davis as its starting point, Anthropology Band is a collaboration between trumpeter Charlotte Keefe and multi-instrumentalist Martin Archer.

Anthropology Band finds atmosphere through a deep rhythm, a searing blues run, a delicate melody, or a cascading solo statement. Band leader Martin Archer has kept the music simple and the structures loose, driven by the bassline, to enable this Who’s Who of UK creative musicians to let the music breathe in a different way each time it’s performed.

There are multiple chordal instruments in the centre of the sound, allowing each soloist to sit on a kaleidoscopic wave of intercrossing figures which push the music forward. Keefe and Archer are joined by Orphy Robinson (xylosynth), Pat Thomas (keyboard), Chris Sharkey (guitar), Anton Hunter (guitar), Dave Sturt (bass) and Adam Fairclough (drums)

“An outstanding collection of improvisers with a programme that is inspired by, but definitely not copied from, electric Miles. It’s how Miles might have sounded if his collaboration with Jimi Hendrix and Gil Evans had come about. Keeffe is a real find, and when Orphy Robinson and Pat Thomas started feeding off each other, the audience erupted.” – Peter Slavid, review of Liverpool International Jazz Festival gig.

Anthropology Band live is supported by project funding from Arts Council England.