GRAEME STEPHEN premieres his new live accompaniment to a classic film at the Sound festival.

THE Aberdeenshire guitarist is well-known on both the jazz and folk scenes in Scotland, and combines those interests in this latest project.

NORTHINGS: Graeme, your new project is a live accompaniment to F. W. Murnau’s film Sunrise – how did that come about?

GRAEME STEPHEN: I saw the film about ten years ago, and it made a very big impression on me, and it’s something that I have had in mind to do more or less ever since.

I did a gig over in Islay at the jazz festival with a quartet that had Phil Bancroft on saxophone, Ben Davis on cello, and Aidan O’Rourke on fiddle, and I felt that group and instrumentation would suit the film.

I managed to get the funding for it from Creative Scotland’s New Music fund, and I was able to take it forward on that basis. The final line-up for this tour has Chris Stout on fiddle, and it’s Chris Wallace on drums.

Guitarist Graeme Stephen

NORTHINGS: How did you set about creating the score?

GRAEME STEPHEN: I haven’t written it as a fully precise score – the way I have been working on it is basically breaking down all the different elements of the film, and trying to create pieces that seemed to work with the images, and that we could play from start to finish. At the same time, I wanted to have a more organic feel to the music, and to leave a bit of space for the musicians to improvise as well, in the spirit of the old silent movie pianists.

That is the way I have approached it, and I’m pretty confident it will work! I also expect the music to grow and change a little as we perform it, so it should be a little bit different every night.

NORTHINGS: Did you work very closely to the images on screen, or is more a matter of creating atmospheres or moods?

GRAEME STEPHEN: A bit of both, really. There are certain actions on the screen that you do have to sync with in the music in a very specific way, so it’s very tight to the images in some places, and has to be, but the way I did it was to watch each scene over and over again and fix a mood or whatever in my mind, and then write a bit of music for it.

NORTHINGS: Why did you chose to go with this instrumentation?

GRAEME STEPHEN: It just felt right, and of course I have worked with all of these guys in various contexts, and I know their playing very well. The options that you get with these instruments are very suitable – you can have quite lush strings sounds with fiddle and cello, for example, but it is also quite a traditional jazz set-up, with cello standing in for bass.

There is a lot to play around with in terms of colour and sound, and I have also tried to incorporate some elements of the individual styles of the players, so it has given me plenty of options.

George O'Brien and Margaret Livingston in F. W. Murnau's Sunrise

NORTHINGS: How will it be performed?

GRAEME STEPHEN: It will be much like going to see a film in the cinema, but with the addition of the musicians set up on the side of the stage playing live to the film. It runs about an hour and half, so I think we will probably just go straight through – most people are accustomed to watching a film of that length at a single sitting in the cinema.

We do it for the first time in Banchory, and then at Eden Court the following night, and then we have two more performances a couple of weeks later, in Edinburgh and Aberdeen.

NORTHINGS: You have worked quite a bit with musicians from folk and classical backgrounds before, including on your CD from last year, Vantage Points, which was inspired by various journeys around Scotland, mainly in the Highlands & Islands. What are the benefits of that mix?

GRAEME STEPHEN: I like to work with musicians that I feel have a really distinctive musical voice, and with players like Chris Stout and Fraser Fifield coming in from the folk side of things, it allowed me to write music that drew on a lot of different styles, and that would reflect everyone’s different approaches to music.

That was how it started, and that is pretty much how it has gone. The music we play is pretty eclectic, and does reflect all the styles that the players bring to the group. I’m conscious of trying to bring in all those voices, and of letting everyone do what they do best within the structure of the music.

NORTHINGS: How did you link up with the cellist, Ben Davis?

GRAEME STEPHEN: I wrote a piece of music quite a while ago that involved cello, and he was recommended to me for that piece. I wanted to work with him again – his sound comes from a different world again from everyone else in the band, and I felt that he would be ideal to write for in the context of adding something else, initially to the sextet and now to this group.

His studies were all classical, but he told me that his father was very into jazz, and he got into it that way. He is a great improviser, which isn’t always the case with classically-trained players, and he fits in to the band really well.

Graeme Stephen

NORTHINGS: On that subject, how did you get into jazz?

GRAEME STEPHEN: I’m not really sure. One of my guitar teachers in Aberdeen, George Norville, played a lot of jazz around town, and I just got into it from wanting to improvise, really. I played a bit of blues, then got into jazz.

NORTHINGS: And I understand you will be sharing a bill with one of your heroes at the London Jazz Festival later this month?

GRAEME STEPHEN: That’s right. NeWt, which is a band I’m in with Chris Grieve and Chris Wallace, are opening for Bill Frisell, which I’m really excited about. Frisell is definitely one of my favourite guitarists, along with Jim Hall, John Scofield, Pat Metheny. It’s not just guitarists – Joe Lovano, for example, has been a big influence. That trio he has with Paul Motian and Bill Frisell – that stuff is really deep.

NORTHINGS: What else do you have coming up?

GRAEME STEPHEN: I’m still playing quite often with Fraser Fifield, and I’m in a couple of trios – NeWt that we mentioned, and also Breach, with Paul Harrison and Chris Wallace. We have just released a CD called On The Walk. I’m also touring again this month with Phil Bancroft’s Home project, which is great fun.

Graeme Stephen’s accompaniment to Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans premieres at the Woodend Barn, Banchory on 11 November, with performances at Eden Court, Inverness (12 November), Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh (24 November) and The Lemon Tree, Aberdeen (25 November).

© Kenny Mathieson, 2011

Links

• Graeme Stephen
• Sound