Michael Garrick

Prior to directing both a trio and a quartet in the closing years of the 1950s, English pianist, organist, and composer Michael Garrick completed literary studies at London University. In the opening half of the 1960s he fused music with literature across more than 250 performances that united poetry and jazz. His initial release, the Blues for the Lonely EP issued by Columbia in 1959, included Joe Harriott, Shake Keane, and poet Jeremy Robson; he also put out Kronos with a separate ensemble. While remaining busy with composition and stage productions of works in varied formats, Garrick issued no further recordings until 1963, when A Case of Jazz surfaced and was soon followed by Poetry and Jazz in Concert. Moonscapes, a 10" LP recorded with drummer Colin Barnes and bassist David Green, was pressed and released independently by Garrick in 1964. Limited to an edition of 99 copies that sold out promptly, the album stayed obscure until Jonny Trunk and his Trunk Records imprint remastered and reissued it in 2007.

Garrick assembled a sextet in 1965 and cut the album Promises for Argo/Vocalion that same year, with Harriott on alto sax, Ian Carr on trumpet, Tony Coe on tenor, and Coleridge Goode on bass. Night/Day and the treasured Black Marigolds both followed in 1966, the latter again featuring Coe and Harriott. During the mid-1960s Garrick explored the harpsichord and began creating jazz settings for liturgical works, the first being the seminal Jazz Praises at St. Paul's, released in 1968. He continued to lead an array of groups—trios, quartets, quintets, and septets—into the early 1970s, producing several albums; among the most significant were The Heart Is a Lotus (with vocalist Norma Winstone) in 1970, Cold Mountains in 1972, and Troppo in 1973, all issued by Argo/Vocalion. Garrick also performed with and composed for the Don Rendell/Ian Carr Quintet and Neil Ardley's New Jazz Orchestra.

Teaching became a central focus for Garrick in the 1970s, and his recording activity grew sporadic. He had already founded the Traveling Jazz Faculty in 1965 to present music and introduce its fundamentals to schoolchildren. Additional posts during the decade included positions at the Royal Academy of Music and the Guildhall as well as a professorship at the Trinity College of Music. At composer John Dankworth's invitation, Garrick launched a jazz course in 1975 for the Wavendon All Music Plan. (Thereafter, education and instruction remained as central to his career as composing and recording.) He did not record again until 1978, when You've Changed appeared with Don Weller, Chris Lawrence, and Alan Jackson. After that date Garrick ceased recording until the 1990s, although from 1984 onward he performed regularly with Chris Hunter and David Green. He formed a sextet in 1983 and a big band in 1985, both of which continue to operate, and his “New Quartet” made its recording debut in 2001.

Garrick resumed his recording career in 1993 with the trio date A Lady in Waiting, again featuring Jackson and Green. The pianist also took on roles as orchestral director and arranger beginning in 1994. Meteors Close at Hand was released that year on his Jazz Academy label and was followed by Parting Is Such, another trio session that included guest appearances by Rendell and violinist Chris Garrick. In 1996 he issued For Love of Duke...and Ronnie on Jazz Academy, which presented his trio, an orchestra, and his first recorded collaboration with vocalist Jacqui Dankworth. He closed the century with Down on Your Knees, recorded by his big band with vocalist Anita Wardell.

Although Garrick maintained a demanding schedule throughout the twentieth century, his activity intensified further in the twenty-first. In 1999 he contributed to the establishment of standards for the Associated Board's jazz examinations. Jazz Academy opened the new millennium with Joe Harriott: Genius, containing nine rare Harriott recordings plus two additional tracks from the period featuring Garrick himself, Keane, Johnny Taylor, and Alan Green. The New Quartet delivered its debut recording in 2001, with Jackson, Paul Moylan, and Martin Hathaway. Garrick shifted direction slightly in 2002 with the folk-influenced Green and Pleasant Land, recorded with Chris Garrick, Dominic Ashworth, and Moylan as Garricks' Strings Quartet. The large-scale orchestral work Peter Pan: Jazzdance Suite (with vocalist Anita Wardell) appeared in 2003. His big-band tribute Big Band Harriott followed in 2004 and was succeeded quickly by 2005's Children of Time, performed by the Michael Garrick Jazz Britannia Orchestra with Norma Winstone. The quartet reconvened for Inspirations in honor of John Coltrane's 80th birthday in 2006.

Norma Winstone—who maintains her own active recording, teaching, and touring calendar—also fronted the Michael Garrick Jazz Orchestra for Yet Another Spring—Births, Marriages & Death in 2007 and for the Ellington tribute suite Lady of the Aurian Wood: For Duke in 2009. Also appearing in 2009 was Garrick's Remembered Time: Songs by and for Bill Evans, performed by his orchestra with vocalist Nette Robinson, who likewise fronted the group for 2010's Tone Poems. Even as his recording and performing commitments stayed vigorous into his seventh decade as a professional musician, the energetic Garrick sustained his teaching through two weeks of annual workshops at his own jazz academy on the Beechwood Campus in Tunbridge Wells. In 2011 the indefatigable Trunk Records released Rising Stars: A Case of Jazz Plus Rare Tracks, drawn from late-1950s and early-1960s sessions by Michael Garrick and Shake Keane. Active and creative to the last despite heart ailments, Michael Garrick died on November 11, 2011, at the age of 78.