Mike Westbrook -

Mike Westbrook (born March 21, 1936) is an English jazz pianist, composer, and bandleader who directed the namesake Mike Westbrook Concert Band through five albums between 1967 and 1970 on Deram. He then assembled the Mike Westbrook Orchestra with a veritable array of new-jazz nameplayers on saxophone (Alan Skidmore, Ray Warleigh), trumpet (Harry Beckett, Kenny Wheeler), guitar (Gary Boyle), bass (Harry Miller), and drums (John Marshall). The orchestra cut the 1971 RCA/Neon release Metropolis with vocalist Norma Winstone. In 1975, a paired-down lineup released Citadel / Room 315 with saxist John Surman as the featured soloist.

Between the two orchestra albums, Westbrook cut two discs with the blues-rock/jazz combo Solid Gold Cadillac. In 1976, he assembled the Mike Westbrook Brass Band for a three-album run, culminating with a live double-LP in 1981 on Polydor.

Background

Mike Westbrook was born Michael John David Westbrook on March 21, 1936, in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire; the son of piano teacher Vera Butler and amateur percussionist Philip Westbrook. He grew up in Torquay and Plymouth and attended Kelly College in Tavistock. Westbrook collected 78 rpm records by Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, Fats Waller, and Duke Ellington as a teenager. He taught himself trumpet and piano and learned to read music without formal composition training.

Westbrook trained briefly in accountancy after school, then completed two years of National Service. He served partly in Germany and saw Lionel Hampton’s band in 1956 at Bournemouth Winter Gardens. Westbrook studied painting at Plymouth Art College after his discharge. He formed his first jazz group at Plymouth Arts Centre in 1958 with fellow art students. Early lineups included guitarist Keith Rowe and saxophonists Lou Gare and John Surman, whose arrival gave Westbrook a four-horn lineup for original material.

Westbrook moved to London in the early 1960s and taught art at West Drayton Grammar School, where future saxophonist Alan Wakeman studied under him. He continued his art studies at Hornsey School of Art. Westbrook led a mid-1960s sextet with Surman, bassist Harry Miller, drummer Alan Jackson, trombonist Malcolm Griffiths, and saxophonist Mike Osborne. His groups played regularly from 1965 through 1967 at Ronnie Scott’s Old Place on Gerrard Street and appeared at Little Theatre Club in Covent Garden. Westbrook recorded a prospective sextet session with engineer Eddie Kramer and a 1966 BBC Jazz Scene session.

Westbrook expanded the sextet into Mike Westbrook Concert Band for Celebration, a 15-part suite premiered in March 1967 at Liverpool University. The Concert Band presented Celebration at Old Place in May 1967 and secured a contract with Decca subsidiary Deram. Westbrook condensed the suite to eight selections for a Deram session with producer Peter Eden.

Discography: