Ian MacGowan
WINDMAP
Improvisations on solo trumpet and flugelhorn
When I came up with the name "Linear Obsessional" for
this label, even though I hadyet to hear it, it was a
recording like Ian MacGowan's"Windmap" I was
thinking of- a simple idea carried through with single-
minded purpose and inspiration. "Windmap" is
straightforward enough- a 40 minute solo brass
improvisation recorded at the artist's home, but what
you hear is the artists imagination take flight as he (to
borrow a cliche) follows a line. This single-take
improvisation has only been edited to give index points
and for the listener's convenience -play the 19 tracks in
the right order andyou get the music as played. For me
what Ian does on this recording is ecstatic and
spellbinding- running through ideas and techniques
often at a breathtaking pace and with great wit- the
musicianship is extraordinary (if that's whatyou're
looking for) and holding everything together like a
magician — except there's no sleight of hand — the
recording is to simple and unembellished for that, is lan's
instant creativity ."Windmap" deserves to take its place
amongst the classics of solo improvisation.
-Richard Sanderson
October 201 4
IAN MACGOWAN
Ian MacGowan has been playing improvised music since
arriving from Dublin in 1990 and has collaborated with
Paul Rutherford, John Stevens, Lol Coxhill and Eddie
Prevost among others. He helped to institute the London
Improvisers Orchestra in 1998 with Steve Beresford and
Evan Parker after the Butch Morris London Skyscraper
tour, and also founded The Gathering with Maggie
Nichols.
In 2000 he recorded his second CD as a leader,
"Daybreak", with Derek Bailey, Veryan Weston, Gail
Brand and Oren Marshall. Into the twenty-first century,
as well as regularly playing with UK and Irish
improvisers, he has also performed with Wadada Leo
Smith, Greg Tate's Burnt Sugar Arkestra, guitarists Han-
earl Park and Reeves Gabrels, the Poet and Detroit
legend John Sinclair, and New York based drummer
Harris Eisenstadt. He has recently collaborated with
drummer G Calvin Weston and has been featured on a
version of John Zorn's gamepiece Rugby which will be
released by Tzadik.
MacGowan "is now a significant figure on the Emanem axis of
British improvisers, a formidable technician and a profoundly
intuitive music maker, with the ability to deliver exactly the
right sound, or very often the right sonic texture, at the
psychological moment." (Brian Morton, Point of Departure)
MacGowan's.. "style has the free-form panache of aWadada
Leo Smith or Joe McPhee, but his experience of other musics is
never too far from the surface. Some of his gestures seem to
derive from earlier forms of jazz, and there are moments of
harmonic directness that)/ou could put chord symbols under.
But it has all been thoughtfully moulded into a highly
convincing and distinctive language." (Philip Clark, Jazz Review)
Ian McGowan
WINDMAP
3. Marin
4. Snamal
5.P0L
6. Zonda
7. Abroulos
8. Minuano
9. Khazri
10. Scjuamish
11. Gilavar
12. Leste
V). Simoom
H. Sundowner
\% Rasbaba
l£ Libeccio
17. Pali
13. Abroholos
1?.Gaoitbe
Solo trumpet and flugel,
London, December 201)
Linear obsessional Recordings 2014
LOROJS
www.linearobsessional.org
