SAXOPHONIST, bandleader and composer Andy Sheppard showcases his latest album Surrounded By Sea at Warwick Arts Centre on Thursday November 19.
Sheppard has established himself as one of Europe’s finest players during a career stretching back to the 1980s – and
one of few British musicians to have made a significant impact on the international jazz scene, playing and writing for settings from solo to big band and chamber orchestra.
Sheppard has composed over 350 works that incorporate a strong and characteristic sense of lyricism alongside a very personal use of rhythms from Asia, Africa and South America.
Sheppard took up the saxophone at 19, highly motivated after encountering the music of John Coltrane, and three weeks after getting his first instrument was playing in public with the Bristol-based quartet Sphere.
After a period in Paris where he worked with groups including performance art band Urban Sax, he returned to the UK in the mid-80s to record his eponymous debut with Steve Swallow as producer, the beginning of a long musical association that continues to this day. Since then he has recorded for labels including Blue Note, Verve, Label Bleu and Provocateur.
Since 2008 he has recorded for Manfred Eicher’s celebrated ECM label.
His current group, Trio Libero, has morphed into a quartet with the addition of Norwegian master of electronica soundscape Eivind Aarset on guitar.
His third album as leader for the label, Surrounded By Sea, includes everything from new compositions to open improvisations, an Elvis Costello tune, and the Gaelic traditional ballad Aoidh, Na Dean Cadal Idir.
Visit www.warwickartscentre.co.uk for tickets and further details.
