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| [KEN
MATHIESON]
drums |
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His
interest in jazz began in his early teens, listening to musicians
as diverse as Louis Armstrong and Miles Davis, Sidney Bechet
and Charlie Parker on record. By the age of 16, he had taught
himself drums and began working in semi-professional Dixieland
bands in Glasgow, but still listening to much more modern
sounds. Lived in Brazil 1970-71, where he played in a night
club in Sao Paulo and began a life-long love affair with all
kinds of Brazilian music.
Following
return to Scotland, worked as a freelance drummer playing
all kinds of jazz, theatrical, cabaret, radio and television
work. For fifteen years
resident drummer at the famous Black Bull Club in Milngavie,
near Glasgow (which was on the circuit for top- flight touring
American and British jazz musicians), and worked with a veritable
Who's Who of world famous players such as Bud Freeman, Wild
Bill Davison, Benny Carter, Sonny Stitt, Art Farmer, Bobby
Hackett, Al Cohn, Johnny Griffin, Sweets Edison, Ruby Braff,
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Shorty Rogers, Teddy Wilson,
Kai Winding,
Tony Coe, Tal Farlow, Martin Taylor, Carol Kidd, Jimmy Witherspoon
etc.
Following closure
of the Black Bull Jazz Club, he ran the first Glasgow International
Jazz Festival in 1987, featuring Sarah Vaughan, Dizzy Gillespie,
Benny Carter, MJQ, Chick Corea, Gary Burton, Stan Tracey,
Peter King and numerous others, but decided all the fun
in the music business is in playing. Subsequently toured
extensively in Europe and North America with Edinburgh-based
Fat Sam’s Band, for which he wrote and arranged a
substantial part of the repertoire.
His wide-ranging
musical interests and arranging skills were further developed
in his quintet, Picante, which featured an eclectic mix
of bebop, hard-bop and punchy Brazilian music arranged in
bop style.
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