The Guardian
The Jazzgroove Mothership Orchestra (JMO) is Australia’s leading jazz orchestra and has gained a reputation as one of the world’s most respected independent Jazz Orchestra’s since its inception in 2003.
The Sydney based musician’s collective Jazzgroove Association’s then artistic directors Lawrence Pike and Cameron Deyell and its members had long discussed forming a big band to provide an outlet for talented composers to have their works expressed by creative musicians. For the Jazzgroove Christmas party at Sydney’s Excelsior Hotel, in December 2003, in stepped Murray Jackson, Simon Sweeney & David Theak and the Jazzgroove Mothership Orchestra was born. The members of the orchestra were drawn largely from the Jazzgroove Association, a policy still in place today.
The JMO has strived to re-define excellence with our position at the zenith of Jazz orchestral composition and improvisation in Australia, through the presentation of two concert seasons per year featuring leading international/domestic artists, sublime guest soloists plus the running of our annual Jazz orchestral composition Competition and the release of world class recordings of original music.
The Jazzgroove Mothership Orchestra was nominated as Australian Jazz Ensemble of the Year 2006, 2007 & 2009. Via commissions and a semi-annual composition competition, the Orchestra has fostered and furthered jazz orchestra writing in Australia, recording and premiering works by Australians such as vocalist-songwriter Kristin Berardi, and composers Steve Newcomb, Sean Wayland, David Panichi, Mace Francis, Ross Irwin, Andy Fiddes and more. In recent years, with the assistance of the Australia Council and the support of Australia’s major jazz festivals, the Orchestra has collaborated with international artists Maria Schneider (USA), Darcy James Argue (USA), Chris Potter (USA), Jim McNeely (USA), Dave Lisik (USA/NZ), Bob Sheppard & Alex Sipiagin (USA), Bert Joris (BE), Charles Tolliver (USA) and John Hollenbeck & Theo Bleckmann (USA).
Musically this ensemble represents many of the finest improvisers Australia has to offer, and features original music from Australia’s most dynamic and creative large ensemble composers all packaged into a super-ensemble. The Mothership’s members have dominated Australia’s top prizes over the last decade including 10 National Jazz Award Finalists (including 3 winners), 4 Freedman Fellows (including 2 winners), 2 Australian Jazz Artist’s of the Year (Bell awards), James Morrison Scholarship Winners, a finalist in the International Thelonius Monk Trumpet Competition plus a finalist at the Hoolieart International Jazz Competition (Belgium).
The music can best be defined as exciting, dynamic and highly original with most of its members being drawn from musician’s collective’s, Sydney’s Jazzgroove Association. The Orchestra has released four critically acclaimed CD’s ‘The Mothership plays the music of Mike Nock’ (2006) ‘Dream Wheel’ (2007) The Mothership meets Kristin Berardi (2010) and Walkabout (2012) featuring Bob Sheppard and Alex Sipiagin.
In 2015 to kick off the year the JMO are performing with Maria Schneider and Jef Neve in a world premiere at the Sydney Festival.
Gathering at the City Recital Hall, the 17 member big band will merge the majestic compositions of Grammy Award- winning Schneider, with Neve’s adventurous and experimental musical spirit, to create an explosive sound storm, merging jazz with rock and classical.
Maria Schneider and her orchestra were recognised in1994 when they released their first recording, Evanescence. As a result of that recording, Schneider developed a personal and genre-blurring composition formula for her 17-member collective. Schneider’s inventive ability received numerous commissions and invitations to conduct with over 85 groups from over 30 countries spanning Europe, South America, Australia, Asia and North America. Schneider’s latest fan-funded recording with Dawn Upshaw (Winter Morning Walks) earned three 2014 GRAMMY Awards: Best Contemporary Classical Composition (Winter Morning Walks), Best Classical Vocal Performance (Dawn Upshaw), and Best Engineered Recording/Classical (David Frost, Brian Losch, Tim Martyn).
Schneider’s long list of commissions include the Carnegie Hall Jazz Orchestra, Peter Sellars’ New Crowned Hope Festival (Vienna’s Mozart Festival), Jazz at Lincoln Center, Los Angeles Philharmonic Association, The American Dance Festival, Kronos Quartet, The Metropole Orchestra, The Danish Radio Orchestra, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and most recently, The Ojai Festival, Australian Chamber Orchestra and Cal Performances.
Jef Neve is widely regarded as one of Europe’s most talented young jazz composers and pianists. Classically trained at Leuven’s Lemmensinstituut, the Beligian pianist has showcased his skills in everything from orchestras to funk-pop bands, but achieved his breakthrough when he teamed up with bassist Piet Verbist and drummer Teun Verbruggen to form the Jef Neve Trio. After releasing four critically acclaimed albums and a soundtrack for Felix Van Groeningen‘s Dagen Zonder Lief, he recorded 2010’s For All We Know with U.S. jazz/hip-hop vocalist José James. Neve has recently recorded a new solo album at Abbey Road Studios in London.
