Liam Noble's Let's Call This

Let's Call This...
Duo album with saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock

Babel Records BDV 2661

We See - Thelonious Monk
Spells - Laubrock/Noble
Alone Together - Dietz/Schwartz
The Electric Ant - Laubrock/Noble/Rochford
Duke Ellington's Sound of Love - Charles Mingus
Let's Call This - Thelonious Monk mp3
Peonies (After Hiroshige) - Noble
Cells - Laubrock
Angelica - Duke Ellington
I'm at Your Throat Now - Laubrock/Noble
Subconscious-Lee - Lee Konitz
Bells - Laubrock/Noble mp3

They are two experienced and creative musicians with attitude, lyricism and expression, ready to walk on a tightrope if necessary…
Let's Call This … brings together two of the most creative musicians on today's jazz scene. It is an album consisting half of standard repertoire and half of entirely improvised pieces. Recorded in just one day, the album is the culmination of a musical partnership between pianist Liam Noble and saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock that has been developing since they first played together in 2002.

Noble and Laubrock are at home in both the jazz mainstream and the avant-garde and this album reflects this. Alongside six entirely improvised tracks are the duos' takes on standards by the likes of Ellington, Monk and Lee Konitz. The standards are approached in a similar way to the improvised pieces and a good example of this is on ‘Alone Together' where they subtly weave their way though the changes, not giving anything away until clearly stating the melody on the final chorus. While each player contributes notable solos, it's the interplay between the two that really stands out, and their wide range of influences, from Stravinsky and Bach, to the duo playing of Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock are apparent throughout.

Drummer, composer and producer Seb Rochford, has added his inimitable touch to four tracks on the album: Spells, ‘The Electric Ant', ‘Cell's and ‘I'm At Your Throat Now'. These tracks were completely improvised by Noble and Laubrock, offering an interesting landscape for Rochford to apply his understated electronic production.

Ingrid Laubrock is a highly sought after saxophonist who was heavily involved in the formation of the prestigious F-IRE Collective and Brazilian quartet Nois4. She won the BBC Jazz Award for Innovation 2004, was nominated for the BBC Jazz Award for Rising Star in 2005 and earlier this year she was awarded an Arts Foundation Fellowship in jazz composition, worth £10,000. An incredibly versatile artist, she also has her own quintet and has performed with a diverse range of musicians including Polar Bear, David Liebman, Kenny Wheeler and Norma Winstone.