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Neil Cowley piano masterclass at the city of Derry jazz and big band festival

Musician in residence at the UK City of Culture this year Neil Cowley was nearing the end of a day of masterclasses in a piano showroom in an industrial estate on the outskirts of Derry during the second day of this year’s City of Derry Jazz and Big Band Festival in Northern Ireland, which continues today and comes to a conclusion at the end of a busy run of gigs on bank holiday Monday. 

With him were three young musicians one of whom was the talented multi-instrumentalist and singer Grim (above, left) who has just released a single ‘Little Fizz’, and who was Cowley’s support act last night at the Nerve Centre venue on Magazine Street for one of the festival’s key concerts. Singer-pianist Caolán McLaughlin (above, right) who also attended would also perform next day outdoors at Guildhall Square, and later at the Bentley wine bar as a member of Mark Black and the Trips. 

The Nerve Centre’s Martin McGill, who organised the workshops, speaking surrounded by organs upstairs inside the Henderson showroom on Northland Road as the masterclass continued below said: “Sixty musicians from across all genres had applied to be musician in residence, and Neil most impressed the City of Culture’s director with his idea for the ‘eighth gate’.”

The new piece, creating an additional metaphorical gate to add to the city’s collection dating back to the seventeenth century siege, will be performed at the defining point of the residency in Ebrington at the massive Venue performance space which hosted the emotive Sons and Daughters concert broadcast by the BBC at the beginning of City of Culture year. “Neil had a strong sense of the piece involving people on the ground and local musicians,” says McGill, and since Cowley’s appointment at the end of last year, the jazz pianist has been working with local school children and musicians towards the autumn performance which will involve choirs, a range of instrumentalists, and a multi-media dimension.

As the workshop reached a conclusion, and Cowley managed to grab a sandwich, in between bites offering suggestions to the class such as: “With tenths wherever you go it sounds richer”, as well as demonstrating from some of his work including ‘Lament’, the haunting atmospheric opening track on The Face of Mount Molehill, the musicians looked on before they each performed.

The Cowley trio return to Derry in June for Music City, an all-day feast of music in the cit,y performing with a choir in a new arrangement of music from Molehill, Cowley’s bestselling album from last year, for a performance at St Augustine’s church. Stephen Graham