Bill Laurance & Michael League ¦ Where You Wish You Were

Bill Laurance (born 2 April 1981) is an English composer, producer, and multi-instrumental musician. Laurance is a member of jazz fusion and funk band Snarky Puppy,^[2] as well as founder and CEO of London-based record label Flint Music.^[3]

Biography

Bill Laurance was born on 2 April 1981 and raised in North London, England. As a child he attended William Tyndale primary school, during which he began learning piano and playing with his school band.^[4] At age 9 Laurance performed on organ during a school trip to London's renowned live-music venue Union Chapel, a locale he would later again perform at as an adult during the recording of his fourth studio album Live at Union Chapel.^[5] Having been trained on ragtime and swing, Laurance first began playing jazz at the age of 14 when he became the resident performer for a small restaurant in the Soho district on the West End of London.^[6] As an adult Laurance attended and graduated from the University of Leeds, studying classical music, composition, and performance.^[6][7]

During his tenure at Leeds, Laurance met traveling University of North Texas jazz student Michael League, the two going on to perform a number of shows together in the UK.^[7] It was here that League and Laurance became close friends. League subsequently invited Laurance to join jazz ensemble Snarky Puppy before the recording of the group's first studio album. With Snarky Puppy's first album The Only Constant releasing in 2006, it wasn't until 2014 when Laurance would go on to release his first solo album Flint.

Laurance is also an artist in residency at Morley College and has taught master classes as a visiting lecturer with The Institute of Contemporary Music Performance.^[8][9]

Film composition

Laurance was a 2018 participant of the Sundance Institute Film Music and Sound Design Lab, taking place at Skywalker Sound in California.^[10] His debut feature film score was for Un Traductor (2018),^[11] an independent drama by directing brothers Sebastián and Rodrigo Barriuso which was named as Cuba's official entry for the 92nd Academy Awards.^[12][13] Laurance also wrote several themes for Initials S.G. (2019),^[11] a film for which co-director and writer Rania Attieh won the 2019 Nora Ephron award at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival.^[14][15] Laurance has also worked alongside Marcus Eaton as composer for the 2019 documentary David Crosby: Remember My Name.^[11][16]

Collaborations

Laurance frequently collaborated with the guitarist, singer, and songwriter David Crosby. He co-wrote and featured on piano in Crosby's track Your Own Ride, lifted from the 2018 album, Here If You Listen.^[17] Laurance is also featured on two tracks from Crosby's 2016 studio album, Lighthouse. Additionally, Laurance provided piano on the recording Somebody Home, dual featured on both Crosby's 2017 album Sky Trails,^[18] and Snarky Puppy's 2016 album Family Dinner – Volume 2.^[19] In a 2018 interview, Crosby described Laurance as "one of the best piano players I've ever met in my life."^[20]

In November 2018, Laurance collaborated with the WDR Big Band of Cologne, performing concerts at Kölner Philharmonie^[21] and Southbank's Queen Elizabeth Hall^[22] in London. The concert in Cologne was recorded and resulted in a live album consisting of nine Laurance compositions, arranged by bandleader Bob Mintzer.^[23]

As a member of Snarky Puppy, Laurance has collaborated with a number of artists and groups, including the Metropole Orkest, with whom the band won a GRAMMY award for the 2016 album, Sylva.^[24] As part of their Family Dinner Vol.1 and Family Dinner Vol. 2 albums, Laurance collaborated with artists including Lalah Hathaway (whom he also accompanied at the GroundUP Music Festival in 2019^[25]), Salif Keita, Susana Baca, Laura Mvula and Jacob Collier.

Awards and honors

• 2014 - British newspaper The Guardian published an article praising studio album Flint, titling Laurance a "jazz maestro".^[26]
• 2014 - Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance as a member of Snarky Puppy for title Something, featuring Lalah Hathaway, from the Snarky Puppy album Family Dinner Volume II
• 2015 - UK digital radio station Jazz FM awarded Laurance as 'Breakthrough Act of the Year'.^[27]
• 2016 - Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album as a member of Snarky Puppy for the album Sylva by Snarky Puppy and Metropole Orkest.^[28]
• 2017 - Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album as a member of Snarky Puppy for the album Culcha Vulcha by Snarky Puppy.^[28]
• 2017 - Online magazine UDiscoverMusic named Laurance's first live album Live at Union Chapel to their 2017 list of 'The 50 Greatest Live Jazz Albums', as well as Snarky Puppy's Sylva with Metropole Orkest.^[29]
• 2021 - Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album as a member of Snarky Puppy for the album Live At The Royal Albert Hall by Snarky Puppy.^[28]

Personal Views

Brexit

In 2019, while touring in Berlin, Germany, to promote his studio album Cables, Laurance played a completely improvisational piano piece channeling the emotions elicited by the UK electorate's decision to officially withdraw from the European Union (EU), commonly referred to as Brexit. Laurance described the decision to leave the EU and the ensuing political events as "total madness and chaos", stating "It's devastating, the prospect, that [he] as a British person wouldn't be part of Europe." In a related interview with Sam Howson of UK film group Mascot Video, Laurance stated "Everything is about to become more segregated and divided. I believe now, more than ever, we need to celebrate what we have in common over what we don't."^[30]

In a 2019 interview with Band on the Wall, Laurance shared "I think now more than ever that it’s important to be active about this stuff. There are things I’ve shied away from in the past, but now I feel like it’s part of the responsibility of a musician to raise these things and be more active. It’s passivity that has led us to Brexit, Trump… so we have to be more engaged".^[31]

Technology and science

In 2019, Laurance released his fifth solo record Cables which was influenced heavily by technology, science fiction, and science fact. In an interview with David Vincent of BrumNotes magazine, Laurance stated, "I’m fascinated by technology and the speed at which it’s growing and I think that it has to be harnessed in some way. If you’re dealing in any creative world I think technology, and using technology, is an important part, and has to be an important part, of what we do."^[32] Examples of Laurance's passion for science and technology can be found throughout Cables, as many of the songs are inspired, named after, and composed in honour of these subjects.^[33]

Track two of Cables, entitled HAL, is named after the fictional artificially intelligent (AI) computer HAL 9000, a character in Stanley Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey'.^[34] Track four of Cables, entitled Ebb Tide, was inspired by climate change and the fragility of the Earth's now rising sea level.^[35] While performing Ebb Tide at Kölner Philharmonie in Cologne, Germany, Laurance stated "Climate change is real."^[34] The final and eighth track of Cables, entitled Cassini, is named after the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft, whose mission was to study Saturn. The cadence of the song follows the spacecraft's final mission, commonly referred to as the "Grand Finale", in which the satellite was deliberately sacrificed in order to maximum scientific output while also preventing biological contamination of Saturn's local moons.^[36][37]

Climate change

Laurance has been vocal about his acceptance of the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change. Laurance is amongst the musicians and music organisations who have signed the Music Declares Emergency declaration, which calls for 'an immediate governmental response to protect all life on Earth.'^[38] During a 2019 concert at La Petite Halle, Paris, Laurance stated "Climate change is real [...] we have to be more active about it."^[39]

Discography

As group member or sideman: ^[43][44]

with Eddie Roberts

• Roughneck (Live In Paris) (One Note Records, 2006)
• The Eddie Roberts Quintet Trenta (One Note Records, 2007)
• Eddie Roberts & Freckles Move (One Note Records, 2010)

with Snarky Puppy

• The Only Constant (Sitmom, 2006)
• Bring Us the Bright (Sitmom, 2008)
• Tell Your Friends (Ropeadope, 2010)
• groundUP (GroundUP, 2012)
• Amkeni with Bukuru Celestin (Ropeadope, 2013)
• Family Dinner – Volume 1 (Ropeadope, 2013)
• We Like It Here (Ropeadope, 2014)
• Sylva with Metropole Orkest (Impulse!, 2015)
• Family Dinner – Volume 2 (GroundUP, Universal Music Classics, 2016)
• Culcha Vulcha (GroundUP, 2016)
• Immigrance (GroundUP, 2019)
• Live at the Royal Albert Hall (GroundUP, 2020)

with Gabby Young & Other Animals

• One Foot in Front of the Other (Fontana North/Musebox. 2014)

with David Crosby

• Lighthouse (Decca / Groundup Music, 2016)
• Sky Trails (BMG, 2017)
• Here If You Listen (BMG, 2018)

with Ana Silvera

• Oracles (Gearbox Records, 2016)

with The Sachal Ensemble

• Song of Lahore (Universal, 2016)

with Michael League

• Where You Wish You Were (ACT Music, 2023)

featured on:

• Mad Mats: Digging Beyond the Crates (BBE, 2017)
• Modern Jazz Dance Classics, Vol. 1 (Staubgold, 2019)

References

External links

• Official Website

Michael League (born April 24, 1984) is an American composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist. He is the bandleader of instrumental band Snarky Puppy and the international music ensemble Bokanté. He also founded the band Forq with keyboardist Henry Hey, and is also an owner and founder of the record label GroundUP Music.^[2] League has won five Grammy Awards.

Early life

League was born in California on April 24, 1984.^[1] He had an attraction to music from an early age and began playing guitar at 13 years old. He started playing bass at age 17, when he was requested to do so in his senior high school jazz band.^[3] He was raised Catholic.^[4]

League went on to study jazz at the University of North Texas, then spent three years playing in Dallas's Gospel and R&B scene under the unofficial mentorship of keyboardist Bernard Wright.^[5] There he performed with gospel artists like Walter Hawkins, Kirk Franklin,^[6] Marvin Sapp, Myron Butler & Levi, and Israel Houghton, and frequently performed at the Potter's House.^[3] He was also a regular member of Erykah Badu's backing band, the Gritz. League moved to Brooklyn, New York, in 2009.

Career

League formed Snarky Puppy in his freshman year of college at the University of North Texas, originally consisting of him and nine of his peers. He composed most of their original music, as well as produced all albums released by the band.

He has performed or recorded with artists from a variety of genres including Laura Mvula, Lalah Hathaway, Joe Walsh, Chris Thile, Michael McDonald, Terence Blanchard, Esperanza Spalding, Joshua Redman, Wayne Krantz, Chris Potter, Salif Keita, Eliades Ochoa, Fatoumata Diawara, Bassekou Kouyate, Susana Baca, and Kardeş Türküler.^{[citation needed]} He served as musical director for David Crosby in his Lighthouse touring band, alongside Becca Stevens and Michelle Willis.

In 2014, League won his first Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance with Snarky Puppy and Lalah Hathaway for a live performance of the Brenda Russell and David Foster song "Something" on the Family Dinner – Volume 1 album.^[5] In 2016, Sylva, the collaborative album between Snarky Puppy and the Metropole Orkest and conducted by Jules Buckley, won a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album, as did the band's follow-up album, Culcha Vulcha in 2017.;^[7] Snarky Puppy's 2020 album Live at the Royal Albert Hall, recorded before a sold-out crowd at the historic London venue, won the 2021 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album.^[8]

League formed the world/blues ensemble Bokanté in 2016, and has produced two albums for the band: Strange Circles, and What Heat. Strange Circles was released on GroundUP Music and What Heat, also a collaboration with Jules Buckley and the Metropole Orkest, was released on September 28, 2018, on Real World Records.^[9] In 2019, What Heat was nominated in the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album category.^[10]

One number on David Crosby's League-produced Lighthouse album featured Crosby, League, Becca Stevens, and Michelle Willis (with Bill Laurence on piano). The quartet became the Lighthouse Band on Crosby's 2018 Here If You Listen album. The band then toured for six weeks in November and December 2018.^[11]

League relocated to Catalonia, Spain in 2020.^[4]

In 2021, League released his debut solo album So Many Me on GroundUP Music. League himself performed every instrument on the album, including vocals, synthesizer, and various Turkish, Moroccan, and Kurdish percussion instruments. The album received critical acclaim.^[12][13]

Selected production work

Michael League has worked as producer or co-producer on 42 albums for artists including:^[14][15]

• David Crosby
• David Crosby, Michelle Willis, Becca Stevens, and Michael League
• Snarky Puppy (all thirteen albums)
• Bokanté + Metropole Orkest (conducted by Jules Buckley)
• Susana Baca
• Becca Stevens
• Bill Laurance
• Forq
• Lucy Woodward
• Alison Wedding
• Malika Tirolien
• Gisela João

GroundUP Music Festival

In 2017, the GroundUP Music Festival, also known as GUMFest, debuted^[16] within the grounds of the North Beach Band Shell in North Beach, Miami.^[17] The first GroundUP Music Festival was initiated by Andy Hurwitz, directed by Paul Lehr, and artistically directed by Michael League.^[18] The festival features performances by Snarky Puppy all three nights, with a line-up curated by League that has featured David Crosby, Béla Fleck and the Flecktones, The Wood Brothers, Robert Glasper, Knower, Concha Buika, C4 Trio, Pedrito Martinez, Jojo Mayer + Nerve, Mark Guiliana's Beat Music, John Medeski's Mad Skillet, Charlie Hunter Trio, Laura Mvula, Eliades Ochoa, Esperanza Spalding, Lionel Loueke, Joshua Redman and Terence Blanchard, as well as the full GroundUP Music roster, among others.^[19][20] GroundUP Music Festival, Miami, is now planned as an annual event.

References