Dave MacRae Trio + Eddie Bronson Trio

Dave MacRae Trio, 8.30 – 9.30pm

A mesmerising pianist, Dave MacRae has been a leading composer and musician in Australia for several decades. His contribution to pioneering jazz/fusion in the UK in the 1970s is widely recognised through his work with great bands like Nucleus, Mike Gibbs Orchestra, Backdoor and the indefinable Matching Mole. Dave has also worked with jazz luminaries including Buddy Rich Band, Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie, Charles Mingus and Chet Baker, as well as long time collaborator, Joy Yates.

Since his return to Australia in 1985, Dave MacRae continues to perform and record mainly with his own trio and visiting internationals and Joy Yates, at Jazz festivals and venues throughout Australia and New Zealand. Tonight, he follows up last year’s successful SIMA performance with two sets of originals with a smattering of standards, supported by an outstanding rhythm section in Lloyd Swanton (The Necks, The catholics) and in-demand percussionist Nic Cecire on drums.

MacRae is a key figure in Australian jazz. New Zealand-born, he played piano with Buddy Rich’s orchestra in the US, and in London was part of jazz-rock’s crowning glory, Matching Mole, and The Goodies’ musical director. Over the last 25 years in Sydney his profile may have diminished, but not his powers. He flitted between the mesmerising ‘Eastern Haze’ and the machismo of the punningly titled ‘El Ninety’ (after the Palm Beach bus). ‘Backwater’ began with eerie, electronically manipulated piano and, despite a swampy groove emerging, retained the dream-like quality that counterbalances MacRae’s zest. Drummer Nick Cecire hit just the right feel. John Shand, Sydney Morning Herald

Dave MacRae (piano) Lloyd Swanton (bass) Nic Cecire (drums)

Eddie Bronson Trio, 10.00 – 11.00pm

Described by the Sydney Morning Herald as “one of the most arresting sounds in Australian music”, Sydney’s legendary saxophonist Eddie Bronson is a highly versatile multi-instrumentalist with a wealth of experience playing in many music genres over the past four decades.

Having a vast performance history with an exciting variety of brilliant Australian and international musicians, most recently forming a quintet with fellow saxophonists Sandy Evans and Andrew Robson. Tonight, Eddie performs high-energy original, spontaneous, free jazz with two leading voices in Australian jazz – the in-demand young rhythm section of the Waples brothers on bass and drums. Expect uplifting, passionate and connected music as Eddie leads the trio through a set of uplifting improvisation at its best.

Eddie Bronson (tenor saxophone) Ben Waples (bass) James Waples (drums)