We’re so excited to announce the details for the launch event for the long-awaited new jazz album from Robin Phillips: ‘Re-Versed’.

The launch event will take place at legendary jazz club, Pizza Express Dean Street, in Soho, London, on Sat 30th November, at 1pm.

The new Re-Versed album has been two years in the making and focuses on the lost verses of the classic jazz standards. The event will feature: Robin Phillips (piano/vocals), Sammy Mayne (sax), Jihad Darwish (bass), and Matt Skelton (drums).

In researching ‘Re-versed’, Robin took on discovering many of the lost verses of the classic jazz standards, songs that everyone knows but with elements that have been lost over the course of time. These ‘sectional verses’ often came from when the song was part of a musical show, when these introductory sections were used to connect the spoken and sung parts of the show. However, these ‘verses’ also give great insight into the story of the song which follows and are interesting from a melodic point of view in their own right. Many of these ‘verses’ have been lost over time, it seems to be due to the restricted length of vinyl recordings, or perhaps the memories of musicians. Robin also made the decision to treat these lost verses as a ‘verse’, so in a many of the pieces on the album, the lost verse is returned to at another point in the song.

Robin holds a crowd with ease, bringing them in to his world with interesting points of reference to share his passion for the songs and the genre as a whole.

At the ‘Re-versed’ album launch, expect to hear a top-level swinging quartet, presenting a mix of swing and groove-based arrangements of songs that, whilst at first you may not instantly recognise them, will quickly reveal themselves to be songs you have known all your life.

We’re very excited to be returning to the PizzaExpress Live jazz club venue on Dean Street in London’s Soho to launch the new album. We decided to schedule the launch at lunch time to help people with families to attend, and also agreed that children can attend free* to hopefully enable the whole family to come and enable children to enjoy a jazz club event!

If you haven’t seen the new music video from the lead song from the album, As Time Goes By, click here to watch. 

Click here to see the launch details or purchase tickets to the event.

Here it is! The music video for the lead track from Robin’s upcoming new lost verses album: Re-Versed.

This beautiful video was shot on a beach at dawn and also features motorbike footage.

This album brings together years of research into the standards and their lost verses and also studio development, with every track recorded at the repmusic studio. The album was mixed and mastered by repmusic.

Album launch on 30 November in London, more details about that next week!

Musicians don’t make money from these endeavours but these videos do help us build our reputation and standing. Views are King so please watch and share the video on any of your social networks, and please also subscribe to the repmusic YouTube channel to see future videos first!

We’re delighted to share the title, concept, and front cover design for Robin’s upcoming new album: RE – VERSED

Robin explains more about the album’s concept:

For this album, I’ve selected a collection of jazz standards and reconnected them with their original ‘sectional verses’: the introductory sections that originally started the song, often connecting the spoken and sung parts from a musical number, and offering more insight into the story behind the main refrain.

We’re excited to announce the band that features on the new Robin Phillips album, ‘Re-Versed’.

The world-class musicians on the new Robin Phillips album were an honour to work with, and are:

Robin Phillips – Vocals, Piano
Jihad Darwish – Upright Bass
Sebastiaan de Krom – Drums
Sammy Mayne – Alto Sax
Brandon Allen – Tenor Sax

Click the links above for studio clips from the musicians.

It was great to be able to get everyone together around gig schedules at the start of the year for a photoshoot, and thanks to Oriole Bar for hosting us.

Look out for some live performances with this cracking line-up to follow. If you are a venue feel free to drop us a line to discuss a performance.

The next event in the Enchanted Cinema & repmusic presents ‘Music & Movies: The Connection’, will take place on Thursday 15th August in the beautiful garden grounds of the Gonville Hotel in Cambridge.

At this event, there will be an outdoor cinema showing of the classic ‘rom com’ When Harry Met Sally, featuring Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan, before which there will be a special performance of ‘Robin Phillips Sings & Plays: Harry Connick jr’.

The soundtrack of the movie featured jazz singer / pianist Harry Connick jr and helped to catapult the artist to international fame. At this event and with a line up of vocals/piano, bass, and drums, the Robin Phillips Trio will perform some classic Harry Connick jr songs including those from the When Harry Met Sally soundtrack, ahead of the screening.

This unique event is not to be missed!

Click here for more information on Robin Sings & Plays: Harry.

Click here to visit the Enchanted Cinema website page for this event, for more information and tickets.

On Sunday 21st July, there will be a ‘Robin Phillips Sings & Plays: Nat King Cole’ performance at Down Hall Hotel & Spa.

Guests can enjoy lunch or Afternoon Tea whilst the quartet entertains with the music of Nat King Cole.

The usual trio of Robin Phillips (piano/vocals), Louis Thorne (guitar), and Joel Humann (bass), will be joined by special guest saxophonist Stacey Dawsonfor this event.

Click here for more information on this programme.

This is a ticketed event: https://downhall.co.uk/events-directory/

Robin will be featuring twice in the 2017 Cambridge Jazz Festival. First with his trio and special guest Sara Dowling in a performance at the Gonville Hotel on Thursday 23rd November, then in a jazz vocal masterclass with Emilia Martensson.

Performance – Thursday 23rd Nov ’17

Robin Phillips returns to the Cambridge Jazz Festival in 2017 to continue his series of vocal performances in partnership with the Gonville Hotel whilst introducing another significant vocalist on the UK jazz scene to the city. Following his 2016 teaming-up with award-winning jazz vocalist Anita Wardell, this year he brings exciting emerging vocalist Sara Dowling to the festival, alongside his London trio.

Tickets are available just for the concert or to also include a special Cotto restaurant two-course meal, served before the performance.

Sara and Robin share a dedicated passion for song, always looking to uncover the stories and history behind the classic jazz repertoire. This has led them both, though separately, into the world of the ‘lost verses’ of jazz standards: the ‘sectional verses’ that often worked as an introduction to songs that first appeared on the stage, offering a segue between the script and song. Whilst a few, like Stardust, have stood the test of time and still remain as a part of the song, many were lost due to numerous factors, including the restriction of available vinyl recording length and the memory of working musicians. These introductory sections of the standards often give great insight into the true meaning of the song, as well as delivering an interesting additional dimension to each piece.

At their Cambridge Jazz Festival performance, Sara and Robin will take turns delivering their picks of the lost verses, whilst accompanying each other with a comfort and ease developed through many performances together in the capital. The singers will be backed by The Robin Phillips Trio, with Jihad Darwish on bass and Alex Best on drums. The performance will also preview material from Robin’s upcoming lost verses album.

Click here for more information and to book tickets.

In the 2017 Cambridge Jazz Festival, Robin returns with another masterclass for jazz singers, but one which is also relevant to instrumentalists wanting to improve their skills at leading a jazz ensemble.

For the masterclass, Robin is teaming up with award-winning jazz vocalist, Emilia Martensson, who will be leading the workshop in the morning, whilst Robin will lead the workshop with her in the second half with help from his trio.

Emilia will be covering many areas including: Improvisation as a group; Composing a piece of music on the spot; Performance technique; Different feels and tempos (counting in); How to lead a group and communicate with musicians; Ear training; and Music theory and much more.

In Robin’s part of the workshop, participants will be given practical tips about working with a band, becoming part of the band, and controlling the performance from within and in the moment. They will also get the opportunity to perform with the trio (time dependent). Emilia will also participate in this section, adding her own insight and tips developed through her own experience. As this section of the workshop is more about band-leading and performance, it would be applicable to instrumentalists as well as singers.

Participants will learn how to lead a jazz performance with a group and be asked to prepare two standards in advance of the workshop (not mandatory and instructions will be sent). At the workshop participants will learn about how to prepare tunes for performance, whether this means putting together lead sheets or arrangements and how each differs, or just knowing the song, key and feel of each number in your repertoire. Participants will also be given the opportunity to lead a tune with the trio, trying out techniques that will be discussed, including: communicating feel to the band, counting in, delivering the tune to the audience – accurately and emotionally, developing the performance by singing/playing around the melody; leading the solos in the moment, and communicating endings on the fly.

Click here for more info and to book a place.

The new Dog & Duck trio album, DownBeat, will be launched on Sunday 3rd Sept, at the monthly jazz session at the Dog & Duck pub, in Linton, Cambridgeshire.

The album was recorded, mixed, mastered, and designed by repmusic in the repmusic studio. All video footage and editing was also done by repmusic.

The album features Robin Phillips on piano and vocals, Jim Free on sax, and Louis Thorne on bass.

See below for two videos from the studio sessions. The album will be available to buy via this website soon.

Dog & Duck Jazz Trio:

Robin will perform in trio format at Annie’s Jazz at Thorpe Hall Golf Club, Southend-on-Sea, SS1 3AT, on Tuesday 1st August, recreating the classic line-up favoured by Nat King Cole of piano/vocals, guitar and bass. For the performance, the trio, featuring Louis Thorne on guitar and Jay Darwish on bass, will delve into Nat’s unbelievable collection of songs…

Click here for the Annie’s Jazz Facebook page..