Reviews: Nikki Iles & Friends

Nikki Iles’ latest offering is a beautifully-crafted and curated set of easy-to-intermediate jazz piano pieces. This is the third book in the series Nikki Iles & Friends. The author says at the beginning of the book that she wanted to ‘reflect the breadth of jazz from its African-American roots, through to fusions with folk, classical and world music.’ With this new ABRSM publication, she has done just that and much more.

Iles is one of the UK’s best-loved jazz musicians, well known for being one of the world’s leading pianists as for her work as a composer with an enormous catalogue comprising her own projects and educational titles.

The volume includes ten of her compositions and arrangements plus originals from notable jazz colleagues, producing a wide-ranging and engaging set of piano pieces. There are so many reasons to commend this latest set. Ever the generous educator, Iles states that the pieces are intended to be a starting point for one’s own creativity, whether that be interpretive or as a launch-pad for improvisation. As with all of Iles’ books, you are guaranteed beautiful arrangements, packed with funky licks and voicings.

The pieces can be enjoyed in their own right, as fully written-out accounts (e.g. for classical musicians), or as examples of useful voicings and licks essential to every jazz pianist. The fingering choices are superb; they not only make sense pianistically but are designed to create certain sounds stylistically at the keyboard. Likewise, the detailed articulation guides the player as to how to approach the tunes with the right rhythmic inflections and feel.

The book brings together a huge range of styles – calypso in Pete Churchill’s Chachalaca, South American carnival in Karen Sharp’s Black Bean Boogie, township in Pete Letanka’s Sophiatown and tango in Mike Gorman’s Dot-to-dot, not to mention West African in the editor’s arrangement of Senwa Dedende. These will appeal as much to classical as to jazz pianists. Folk song is also a strong thread in Mission: To Be Where I Am (Jan Garbarek) and the Yiddish song Shlof Mayn Kind, both arranged by Iles.

Of the original compositions, tunes are often inspired by fun observations or situations, as with Karen Sharp’s Last Bus Home depicting a journey after a long day, complete with bumpy roads, chattering and the bus stopping, or Mike Gorman’s depiction of a cheeky squirrel gathering nuts and acorns in The Sneaky Squirrel. Phil Peskett’s A Dream on the Prairie, meanwhile, piles up open fifths to build an aural picture of the North American prairie, and Nikki Yeoh offers a Scottish-influenced number in Piping in the Haggis.

Standards form part of the collection too, with arrangements of St James Infirmary, made famous by Louis Armstrong and Count Basie, and I’m an Old Cowhand by Johnny Mercer. There really is something here for everyone.

The 22 pieces range from Initial Grade to Grade 3 and are appropriate for all age groups. The book comes with a code to access audio downloads of the pieces online, recorded in the excellent acoustic of The Warehouse in London. There is information about each composer and their pieces, which is useful both for background information but also programmes and introductions to performances. This is a fantastic selection, beautifully written and assembled by one of the UK’s national musical treasures.