Simon H. Fell

2005 release ** "As a composer, Fell applies serialism with an enthusiasm and relish which hasn't been heard since the advent of minimalism, when it was declared a dead dog. In Fell's work this dead dog proceeds to gnaw at accepted practice and compositional cliché with a rabid intensity that many listeners find shocking. The challenge is to get modern compositions played with the emotional commitment and trenchancy of jazz, and in this Fell excels; by going right into the complexitudes of Stockhausen's sixties composition and applying what he's learnt to the jazz of Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus and Henry Mancini, Fell has arrived at something completely new. This jaunty, speculative, bright music - with its sudden squishes, collapses and crises - is actually the dirty truth you've been trying to find in the dodgy grunge you love so much."