Pryor Engagement

Ian Bousfield
Accompanied by the Black Dyke Band
Conductor: Dr. Nicholas Childs
Doyen Recordings: CD 212
Total playing Time: 61.53

~ Buy with 4barsrest shopping

Just like his contemporary, Herbert L. Clarke (1867-1945), the name and reputation of Arthur Pryor (1870-1942), the so called ‘Paganini of the Trombone' has become a byword for technical brilliance and musical artistry. 

As with Clarke, the passing of time has been kind to him, not just because he was such a fabulous player, but because he too was clever enough to realise that with the coming of more technically adept recording techniques by the time he had passed the peak of his powers, the only way posterity could recall him would be as a performer in decline. Both he and Clarke took to the baton by the time they were around 40 years of age, and only occasionally would they display their playing prowess thereafter.

Thankfully, that will hopefully not happen with Ian Bousfield. The Principal Trombonist of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra is a player of the very highest world rank, a performer Pryor himself would no doubt have enjoyed and relished listening to as much as Bousfield himself has enjoyed and relished the opportunity to step back into the mists of time by paying homage to the great American.

As is shown to delightful effect on this recording, Bousfield is a true disciple of Pryor. An instinctive and persuasive performer, full of technical brilliance and musical nuance, he has a veritable field day on the 12 tracks he performs with the accompaniment of the Black Dyke Band under Dr. Nicholas Childs.

More than anything, Bousfield understands Pryor the artiste. His comprehensive, warmly written sleeve notes detail the life and times of a player he himself can readily identify with. Pryor was an intelligent man as well as a glorious performer, and Bousfield is quick to emphasise the fullness of the life he led and evidently enjoyed away from the confines of Sousa and his band.

Although Pryor disliked the new fangled ‘rag time' (he called it ‘the parasite of music') he did compose a number of solos in the genre, and it is a pity, as Bousfield himself states, that we do not hear any of them here. As a composer though, and on the evidence of this recording, Pryor was a man who also knew his limitations.

Many of his works are redolent of their time; almost music hall parodies in fact, as they open with a short introductory ensemble flourish to reveal the soloist in all his technical glory in an eye popping cadenza. Thereafter a common template of exposition is drawn upon in variations and less than subtle developments.

The music Pryor played has not fared anywhere as well as the performer himself, and the musical link between himself and Clarke can be heard openly in places with inversions of each others solos (The Shores of the Mighty Pacific is clearly pinched at one point in ‘The Patriot'), whilst the opening ‘Bluebells of Scotland' and closing ‘Annie Laurie' are two peas in Scottish broth pod. Most appear to be in the same key.

The modern Paganini, Ian Bousfield understands this too, and delivers each of the up beat tracks with a delicious sense of wit and elasticity. He performs them as Pryor surely would have, with a theatrical sense of playfulness that never descends into farce, but somehow just pokes enough tongue out to the audience so they chuckle with self satisfied appreciation of his skill. The slower items also reveal a different aspect too, with a slightly melancholic sense of Victorian pathos that tugs at the heart strings without becoming maudlin. It takes a real class act to do just that.

You simply cannot fault Bousfield's approach to the music. His technique is sparkling, his musicality warm and lyrical. His ability to play the fast semi quaver work is based on his own ‘short cuts', a similarity he shared with Pryor who learnt by trial and error until told by a pool player that in fact there were seven positions on a trombone slide! The results are spectacular.

There is a case to perhaps query the reluctance of the soloist not to perform at least one item on a small bore period instrument, but he does give a fairly well argued response. The arrangements themselves are pretty good and there is sense in some of the skilful scoring of that lighter Sousa Band sound.

If there is a shortcoming however it is that at times the undoubted brilliance of the playing is dulled by the lack of variety of the repertoire, whilst it would have been nice to have learnt a little more about each of the pieces and when and why they were written.

Overall though this is an outstanding release, with a superb level of recording ambience, excellent accompaniment and post production, and even a cover picture which sees Ian dressed in a uniform that makes him look like a cross between a lion tamer and a soldier of the 24th Foot and Mouth brigade.

In its way though it sums up the appreciation of a performer who knew exactly how to put in a show to entertain the audience. Ian Bousfield and Arthur Pryor: Two Paganini's of the trombone.

Iwan Fox     

~ Buy with 4barsrest shopping

^back to top