Pete Oxley – ‘Hejira’ tour starting 26 Feb.

Guitarist Pete Oxley has a new seven-piece band called Hejira which will be touring, with several dates in England and Scotland. The tour starts with an album launch on 26 Feb at the Jazz Cafe in Camden.

Pete Oxley’s Hejira is a septet formed to celebrate the music of Joni Mitchell, and drawing primarily from the late 1970s albums dubbed by many as her ‘jazz period’: The Hissing of Summer Lawns (1975), Hejira (1976), Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter (1977) and Mingus (1979).

Although Mitchell herself never termed her music across these albums as ‘jazz’, she had certainly expanded her harmonic language and taken the writing in a new direction of sophistication. She was hiring A-lister musicians who were very much from the jazz world, such as Larry Carlton, John Guerin, Jaco Pastorius, Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter.

In 1979 Mitchell put together a band to tour the repertoire from those albums, featuring Michael Brecker, Pat Metheny, Lyle Mays, Jaco Pastorius and Don Alias. The recording from one concert in Santa Barbara resulted in the live album, Shadows and Light.

It is from this album that Oxley’s Hejira band is drawing the bulk of its material – and the spirit of the performances. In much the same way that Mitchell selected a personnel that would ‘serve the music’ (as a priority over being called for their respective virtuosic abilities), bandleader Pete Oxley has put together a group of seasoned jazz musicians who are there, above all, to honour the songs.

Knowing that Oxley’s Hejira is not much more than a year old, I asked him to explain how the group came about and how it seems to have got so busy, so quickly:

“I put this group together for the Christmas ’22 gig at The Spin (in Oxford) with the idea of it being a ‘one-off’ date. I’d loved Shadows and Light for decades and it just struck me that this would be a beautiful and exciting thing to do. I started thinking about players I knew that I figured would be both great instrumentalists and, of equal importance, fans of this music. I struck gold right from the off, as everybody I called was totally into it, immersing themselves in the music and preparing thoroughly for what we all thought was just the one gig. I asked them all if they’d like me to prepare charts ­– but each member was happy to research their own parts. I made clear that it wasn’t intended as a ‘tribute band’ but that the idea was to essentially replicate the spirit and vibe of Shadows and Light.

“The ace in the pack was revealed in having asked Hattie Whitehead to front the band. Not only has Hattie assimilated the power, intonation, and poise of Joni’s vocals, she also plays guitar with much of Mitchell’s mannerisms. Hattie is an extraordinary performer and I think that a big part of that – aside from her deeply musical attributes ­– is that she is completely egoless in her delivery of the songs. She is totally committed to the context of the song she is communicating to the listener.

“The gig went incredibly well so we thought we should do at least one more, having put the work in necessary to be able to present that programme. We booked a repeat performance at The Spin and by good chance, met up with Ina Wieczorek, a well-established booker of classical and jazz artists. Thanks to Ina’s industry, we ended up with about 25 shows last year – and 2024 might see nearly double that!”

ALBUM: The band performed at the 2023 EFG London Jazz Festival at The Cockpit and that concert was recorded, producing a live album which will be released at The Jazz Café, Camden, on 26 February.

TOUR:

THE BAND: Hattie Whitehead: vocals and guitar / Pete Oxley: guitar / Ollie Weston: saxophones & bass clarinet /
Chris Eldred: piano & keyboards / Dave Jones: fretted & fretless basses / Rick Finlay: drums / Marc Cecil: percussion.