Mike Westbrook, The Uncommon Orchestra

Mike Westbrook & Company: 'The Uncommon Orchestra'
In "A Bigger Show": Music by Mike Westbrook, Words by Kate Westbrook

"An exhilarating contemporary spin on the big band tradition" The Guardian

Composer/bandleader Mike Westbrook returns to Bristol with his new 22-piece band; "The Uncommon Orchestra" and a brand new jazz entertainment.

'A Bigger Show' has been described as a Jazz/Rock Oratorio. Kate Westbrook's scenario uses the image of the fairground to examine, with irony, humour and high drama, the lot of Humankind in the age of the World-Wide-Web.

The ensemble involves 3 vocalists/actors, acoustic brass and saxophones, electronics and a double rhythm section.

Kate is joined by fellow vocalists Martine Waltier and Billy Bottle, while Mike Westbrook & Company brings established Jazz musicians together with lesser known artists, Pop and Rock musicians, Classical players and talented young musicians in a new kind of big band - the Uncommon Orchestra.