Dave Gelly 

Bobby Wellins and SNJO: Culloden Moor Suite review – haunting eloquence

Bobby Wellins’s 1961 suite has finally been recorded as he imagined it, writes Dave Gelly
  
  

boby wellins culloden moor suite review
Worth the wait… Bobby Wellins. Photograph: PR

Glasgow-born Bobby Wellins composed an early version of this work more than 50 years ago, and recorded it in 1965 with Stan Tracey and a simple quartet. It stayed with him over the years and here it is at last, as he first imagined it. In place of the quartet is the 16-piece Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, with the composer’s poignant harmonies sensitively orchestrated by Florian Ross. One thing, however, hasn’t changed – the sound of Wellins’s tenor saxophone. His dry, haunting tone and spare, eloquent phrases dominate the performance and make this an outstanding album.

 

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