Tag Archives: Earthtones

The Kings’ Swingers

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Rather than murder the moment with a seasonable catastrophe from the office choir at VoxCarnyx – that’s Keith and Ken – we thought it more in the spirit of things to respect our readers’ good taste with a Yuletide link to this year’s Christmas Single from the hybrid musical world of Earthtones.

They’re the classy genre-fluid trio established in 2019 by eminent jazz pianist Euan Stevenson in collaboration with two familiar frontline stars from the classical world: the RSNO’s principal flautist Katherine Bryan and her orchestral colleague, associate principal cellist Betsy Taylor. 

In the past they’ve given us a heart-warming God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen and a restoratively goo-free O Holy Night, This year, they offer pageantry with a swing in We Three Kings, another classic Stevenson arrangement in which sophisticated cool meets seasonal cheer.

It’s straight out of the Earthtones playbook. “We got going as a trio just before Covid,” Stevenson recalls. He and jazz saxophonist Konrad Wiszniewski had been doing a project with the Glasgow String Quartet, in which Taylor is cellist. “That’s how I got to know Betsy and we began to do some duo pieces together. I thought we should add a treble voice to the mix and Betsy suggested Katherine. So I started writing music for that line-up and it was an instant hit. We first performed together in 2019.”

We Three Kings is a mastery of blend. Stevenson sets the scene with a smooth Satie-esque intro, its short-long rhythmic heartbeat the springboard to blossoming flute-cello conversations that ebb and flow with constantly refreshed narrative. Bryan adds a natural jazz swing to her easeful signature virtuosity; Taylor offers penetrating character and flexibility to a role that combines the lyrical with the fundamental. Stevenson meshes everything together, the fluid instigator of scene shifts and mood swings. 

There’s an unceasing flow of sensory exhilaration from music that is complex yet intimate, which  throws in snapshots of Brahms without ever becoming pretentious. Ultimately we’re invited to bask in the fireside familiarity of a well-known carol animated through pure class and imagined pleasures. These biblical monarchs appear to enjoy a few laughs along the way, some cheeky moments, maybe an imagined stop-off to pick up those precious gifts. 

Guided by their own star, Earthtones have produced yet another Christmas cracker.

Watch it here.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Further information at www.earthtonestrio.com

Earthtones Trio / Christmas Single

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Fancy a dash of sophistication with your easy listening? Something warm and Christmassy to cosy up to after a traumatic year? Maybe it’s time to discover the golden strains of the Earthtones Trio. 

They are familiar faces to Scots classical music audiences – principle flautist Katherine Bryan and associate principal cellist Betsy Taylor from the RSNO with cross-genre pianist and composer Euan Stevenson – and they’ve just released a couple of red-hot Christmas crackers as a double A-side single.

The melodies are perennial favourites, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen and the normally syrupy O Holy Night. But it’s Stevenson’s classy arrangements that add gilded veneer to what would otherwise constitute routine seasonal fare. Void of sentimentality, energised by the piano’s liquid moto perpetuo and the silken interplay of flute and cello, they elicit irrepressible charm with ne’er a cliched moment.

While Stevenson’s jazz inclinations are most palpable in God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, they are neither out of place nor overstated. The rippling piano opening, spiced with pseudo-impressionist harmonies, its rhythmic stresses dreamily out of kilter with the first glimpse of the tune on flute, are just a gateway to a track that radiates autumnal joy. Echoes of Chick Corea inform soft multicoloured harmonies. The cello’s mellowest range is predominant, the flute taking flight with short improvisational bursts. The emphasis is on cool.

If this is the Yuletide claret, O Holy Night is the mulled wine. Sleepier arpeggios from Stevenson set a moody tenor for Taylor’s expansive, rich-roasted unfolding of the theme. With Bryan’s entry – a magical, near-imperceptible presence – comes a blossoming dialogue between the two that is genuinely moving. Tears will be shed, for all the right reasons..
Ken Walton

Full information on how to purchase or stream Earthtones’ Christmas single is at www.earthtonestrio.com