Founder and leader of the
long-lived British modern jazz group SPIRIT
LEVEL (19791999), London-based pianist Tim Richards'
style has been described as:
"Luminously funky...
Iaced with the blues."
The ROUGH GUIDE
to JAZZ
and as:
"A unique mixture formed
from his admiration of both the expansive, robust playing of
McCoy Tyner and the luminous delicacy
of Abdullah Ibrahim."
The TIMES
Tim Richards' first encounter with a piano
was at the age of 8 in a dentist's waiting room. After classical
piano lessons he began to teach himself
jazz and blues from the age of 14, when he saw Thelonious Monk
and Otis Spann on TV.
In recent years, Tim has won acclaim as
a composer and arranger, developing ideas in the larger instrumental
setting of his nine-piece band GREAT
SPIRIT, which has featured key players on the British scene
such as Pete King, Ed Jones, Gilad Atzmon, Denys Baptiste, Tony
Kofi, Jason Yarde, Roger Beaujolais, Seb Rochford and many others.
The band released their second CD Epistrophy
(33Jazz120) in 2005 (5-star
on-line review), and toured the UK for the fourth time in
November 2006 with Finnish saxophonist Jari
Perkiomaki, with the help of a New Music award from the PRS
Foundation.
Tim has a Masters Degree in composition
from London's Trinity College of Music, and has written pieces
for a wide variety of non-jazz ensembles, from string quartet
to symphony orchestra, also collaborating with dancers and filmmakers.
To hear a selection, please visit the MySpace
composition page. See also Commissions.
In a more straight-ahead vein, the TIM RICHARDS TRIO have entertained audiences
from Istanbul to Inverness. The trio's second CD Twelve
by Three is out now on 33Jazz.
The TRIO on YouTube
playing Charlie Parker's 'Au Privave'
