HAQ Tour – Ambleside

Haq on tour in the UK.

Zeffirelli’s, Compston Road, Ambleside, LA22 9AD

8pm, Free entry.

www.zeffirellis.com/

HAQ Tour – Leeds

Haq on tour in the UK.

The Chillout Session, The Wardrobe, 6 St Peter’s Square, Leeds, LS9 8AH

9pm, Free entry

www.thewardrobe.co.uk

HAQ Tour – Whalley Range

Haq on tour in the UK.

The Hillary Step, 199 Upper Chorlton Road, Whalley Range, M16 0BH

8:30pm, free entry.

This will be a stripped-down show, either a duo (sax/guitar) or trio with bass, or I suppose, a crammed-in quartet…

HAQ Tour – Bath

Haq on tour in the UK

St. James Wine Vaults, St James Square, Bath, BA1 2TW

8:30pm £4/3

www.stjameswinevaults.co.uk

HAQ Tour – Manchester

Haq on tour in the UK.

Matt ‘n’ Phreds, Tib Street, Manchester, M4 1LW

9pm Free Entry

www.mattandphreds.com

HAQ/Beats & Pieces reviews + Jazzwise

Both the HAQ and Beats & Pieces EPs have been reviewed by Sean Gregson in the Tasty Fanzine (www.tastyfanzine.org.uk) – cheers Sean! You can read both by clicking here (HAQ immediately follows Beats & Pieces) but selected highlights for both follow, HAQ first…

Guitarist, Anton Hunter, and sax player, Sam Andreae, weave beautiful melodies that create a real sense of story-telling… What’s so impressive about HAQ is their ability to cut through the shit and get right to those basic emotions we all share, each track offering a truly distinctive and unique journey.

…when I first heard the Beats and Pieces Big Band, my mind drifted to a future where I could say, ‘Me? Oh, yeah, I’ve been into them since the beginning’. It’s hard to place the music that they create. Attempting to describe is a challenge in itself. Let’s just say, though, this is a beast.

The Beats & Pieces EP was also recently featured in the March 2010 issue of Jazzwise magazine, where it was featured in Mike Chadwick’s Cutting Edge chart at number 9… Mike’s also played tracks from the EP on his show on Jazz FM, cheers for the support!

As always, if you spot something in the press or on the internet or hear something on the radio about any of the Efpi artists, please let us know! You can e-mail us at efpirecords@gmail.com

Beats & Pieces Big Band @ Marlborough Jazz Festival

Times TBC but keep an eye out on the festival website for more info…

Beats & Pieces Big Band + Alice Zawadzki & The Sky Project @ West Didsbury Conservative Club, Manchester

Big band double bill in West Didsbury! We’ll be performing a set before heading down to London to begin our tour in Camden, and after us the amazing singer and violinist Alice Zawadzki will debut her brilliant new band, the 18 piece Sky Project (directed by Jo McCallum). Also performing will be the Sam Rapley/Adam Chatterton Quartet.

Free entry although donations towards the running costs of both bands will be gratefully accepted!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY EFPI!!!

We realised recently, to our great amazement, that Efpi Records was coming up for it’s first birthday. Well, the big day is now here, so……HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

This seems like an appropriate time to reflect on the last year I suppose. Well, Beats & Pieces was still in its infancy this time last year and I think we were hardly past Tune 2 with HAQ, neither bands had even entered the studio yet. The year has flown by and when I think about it, we’ve achieved a fair amount (I’ll count upcoming achievements in that bag too I think). Two releases, two more on the way, a very pretty and colourful website, gigs booked in across the country and Europe including several festival dates, a UK tour for HAQ and new album recording booked for May, we’ve had mentions in the MEN, Jazzwise and some top blogs, radio play, B&P got a mention in Mike Chadwick’s “top 10 wicked things ever in the history of everything chart”…. (or something like that..?) wow, what else……. Urm…. Anton has expanded his own Noise Upstairs empire with a label all of it’s own and expansion to different cities, so watch out! And Ben has truly turned into the promotional mastermind we never knew he could be, feels weird for Ben to be kicking us up the arse about getting gigs and other boring stuff generally associated with Anton…. I’ve just been living in various Nordic countries, oh well, maybe I’ll settle down in the coming year.

I personally wanna thank Ben and Anton for being such fantastic partners, they’ve really been the backbone of Efpi over the last 8 months or so. We seem to make a good team though so hopefully you’ll be seeing much more to come. There does seem to be a worrying correlation between our apparent success and my distance in miles from Manchester though….. hum….

Finally, thanks to everyone who has supported Efpi whether by visiting the site, buying CDs, coming to gigs, giving us their time and advice and of course all the musicians who are involved in Efpi projects.