The HSP performs the music of the Hollywood Saxophone Quartet, West Coast "chamber jazz" from the fifties.

Charlie Parker recorded with a string orchestra, Duke Ellington wrote suites and symphonies while Stravinsky processed jazz and blues in his music. This was the period in which the legendary though obscure Hollywood Saxophone Quartet was formed by four of Hollywood's best recording musicians: Russ Cheever (soprano sax), Jack Dumont (alto sax), Morrie Crawford (tenor sax), Bill Ulyate (baritone sax). They worked for Stravinsky, Schönberg, Sinatra, Disney and countless others. The Hollywood Saxophone Quartet brought out four records: "Warm Winds" and "French Impressions" with classic repertoire, "Jazz in Hollywood" and "Sax Appeal" with jazz material. The records are collector's items, and have never been released on CD. On the jazz records Mike Rubin on bass and Richie Cornell on drums were added.

Arrangers Lyle "Spud" Murphy, Lennie Niehaus, Jack Montrose, Warren Barker, Jack Marshall, Russ Garcia, Billy May, and others, helped the HSQ to define a new era of chamber jazz (arranged jazz for smaller groups). Their music spanned a bridge between the world of jazz and classical music. However, in the pieces recorded there is hardly any improvising. The form is classical music, the idiom is jazz. The arrangements are small masterpieces.

Barry Block, Vincent Kuit, Arjen Schalker and Maarten Stuurman founded SaxProject by the end of 2004 to explore the sound of the sax section of a big band. The search for direction went from classical (Bach), traditional published sax quartets, to East Coast jazz, but seemed always to point to the swinging close harmony and rhythmic refinement of West Coast jazz. From the beginning, Barry Block, who grew up in Los Angeles, tried to get the other musicians interested in the jazz repertoire of the Hollywood Saxophone Quartet. Apart from the HSQ music being extremely demanding technically, it appeared, after ample search, impossible to find in written form. Making transcriptions became a long and difficult job and when, in American libraries, more formerly published arrangements were found, we ended up with a repertoire that demands to be played.

Bookings: telephone +31(0)299 - 657011 • e-mail info@saxproject. nl