Siglo Section Big Band with Kat Rees, Melville Centre, Abergavenny, 27/09/2025 (part of Wall2Wall Jazz Festival).

Loz Collier, Mike Mason, Catrin Nichols, Katie Martin – trumpets

Harri Archer, Liam Belford, Sarah Mann – trombones

Alex Bingham, Em Craig – tenor saxes

Evan Extence, Rhys Ponting – alto saxes

Alex Lloyd – baritone sax

Newman Tai – piano

John Close – guitar

Benedict Stevens – double bass

Iori Haugen – drums

Kat Rees – vocals

The Siglo Section Big Band is a Cardiff based collective founded in 2019 by trumpeter Loz Collier and drummer Matt Lush, the band’s musical directors, principal arrangers and de facto leaders.

The band is largely comprised of alumni from the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama (RWCMD) and the band name is derived from ‘siglo’, the Welsh word for ‘swing’.

In addition to the full on big band the members of the Siglo Collective also perform in smaller units, usually as a quartet or sextet and sometimes with guest vocalists.

In 2020 members of Siglo Section collaborated on a remarkable remote big band performance for the Virtual Brecon Jazz Festival. The music was recorded in lockdown on-line, with tracks being built from the drums upwards, with the rhythm tracks featuring drums, bass, piano and guitar being laid down first before parts were emailed to the leaders of the trumpet, trombone and woodwind sections, who in turn forwarded them on to their colleagues. Collier then edited and mixed the musical performances while Lush masterminded the accompanying videos.

It represented a remarkable achievement and it was only fitting that Siglo Section should eventually be invited to Brecon Jazz Festival to play for a real live audience, which they did at The Guildhall as part of the 2024 Brecon Jazz Festival. They were rewarded with a near packed house and the fans were treated to a terrific performance by a young and highly accomplished band whose members looked as if they were enjoying every minute of it.  I was in attendance and reviewed the show as part of my Festival coverage. It was a performance that turned out to be an unexpected Festival highlight.
https://www.thejazzmann.com/features/article/brecon-jazz-festival-2024-main-weekend-sunday-11th-august-2024

With this in mind I was very much looking forward to seeing Siglo again as part of this special collaboration with Welsh vocalist and songwriter Kat Rees.

Rees describes herself as a “bi-lingual vocalist” and is capable of singing in both Welsh and English. In 2024 she collaborated with the Siglo Section to produce a three song EP that has been described as the first ever Welsh language big band album. We were to hear two selections from this landmark recording this evening.

Rees’s other projects include a duo with pianist Laurie Rich, a quartet with pianist Thomas Barber, bassist Benedict Stevens and drummer Patrick Barrett-Donlon and the Welsh language funk / soul /gospel ensemble EôS.

Rees also appeared at the 2024 Brecon Jazz Festival fronting a quintet that included Stevens and Barrett-Donlon plus pianist Evan Williams and guitarist Aaron Shotton. The group performed an eclectic mix of jazz standards, traditional Welsh folk songs and Rees’ original songs, with the leader variously singing in Welsh and English. Again this performance is reviewed as part of my Festival coverage.
https://www.thejazzmann.com/features/article/brecon-jazz-festival-2024-main-weekend-friday-9th-august-2024

For their visit to Wall2Wall Siglo had attracted another pleasingly large crowd and the evening featured a mix of big band instrumentals plus a number of songs, some of them original, featuring Rees as guest vocalist.

By its very nature the line up of the Siglo Section is necessarily fluid and tonight’s show featured many new faces that hadn’t been part of the ensemble at Brecon. Collier was present in the trumpet section and was the arranger of many of the pieces and effectively the unwritten leader of the band. Lush had been replaced at the kit by Iori Haugen, so I’m not sure if he’s still part of the Siglo set up.

The band hit the ground running with a rousing arrangement of “Big Swing Face”, a tune associated with Buddy Rich. Punchy brass and reeds, dynamic drumming and the feverish guitar comping of John Close helped to establish an authentic big band sound and we also enjoyed the cogent soloing of pianist Newman Tai, alto saxophonist Evan Extence and trumpeter Mike Mason, playing his first gig with Siglo but obviously a very experienced big band performer.

Rees joined the band as Siglo kept the pot bubbling with a rollicking version of “Let The Good Times Roll” with tenor saxophonist Alex Bingham the featured instrumental soloist.

The jazz standard “All The Things You Are” cooled things down a little and was performed as an ensemble piece (no instrumental solos) fronted by Rees’ assured vocals.

Rees likes to add Welsh language lyrics to existing jazz standards or popular songs and next up was a Welsh language version of Van Morrison’s “Moondance”, performed by Rees with the four man rhythm section of Tai, Close, Stevens and Haugen plus trumpeter and band leader Loz Collier. She had also performed this song with her quintet at Brecon and it’s good to hear somebody doing something new with the rather over familiar “Moondance”. Collier’s use of the Harmon mute during his trumpet solo was somewhat reminiscent of Miles Davis.

Rees’ adaptation of the traditional Welsh hymn tune “Calon Lan” was centred around a bass line she had borrowed from pianist Nils Kavanagh’s composition “Hazelwood Home”.Again this was performed in a scaled down format featuring just piano, bass and drums, with Haugen variously deploying brushes and bare hands. The Welsh lyrics were augmented by a scat vocal episode that saw Rees exchanging phrases with pianist Tai.

Rees left Siglo to their own devices as the ensemble romped through the Maynard Ferguson tune “Cruisin’ For A Bluesin’”, an example of “a big band going crazy” as Collier put it. In addition to the rousing ensemble playing we also enjoyed rumbustious solos from Mason on trumpet, Lloyd on rasping baritone sax and Bingham on tenor. The saxophone section was also featured, with just drummer Haugen for company, while the sticks man also enjoyed a feature of his own. Exhausting stuff, as Ferguson’s tunes often are.

By way of contrast the Quincy Jones ballad “For Lena and Lennie” featured the softer sounds of muted trumpets and a thoughtful tenor sax solo from Em Craig.

Kat Rees returned for a lively and swinging rendition of “Route 66”, encouraging the audience to sing along with the last line of the chorus. The featured soloist was trumpeter Mike Mason, playing first with a plunger mute to give a raunchy, bluesy, vocalised sound, and later more sweetly with an open bell.

There was more audience participation as Rees led the crowd in a chorus of “Happy Birthday”, dedicated to two members of the trumpet section, Loz Collier and Catrin Nichols.

Rees’s original “Seren Wen” appears on the previously mentioned EP and featured a Welsh language lyric alongside the instrumental soloing of alto saxophonist Evan Extence, a versatile musician who is equally capable on tenor.

The first set concluded with what Collier described as “a funk tune”. The Roy Hargrove composition “I’m Not Sure” from the late trumpeter’s 2008 album “Earfood”. This instrumental was notable for excellent solos from Tai at the piano and Mason on trumpet.

Set two commenced with Rees singing a swinging version of the Duke Ellington composition “Satin Doll”. This was followed by a similarly lively “Sunny Side of the Street” with Rees’ vocals complemented by Mason’s muted trumpet solo.

Rees’ fondness for applying Welsh language lyrics to classic jazz tunes was again in evidence on an adaptation of Errol Garner’s “Misty”, sung in Cymrag.

Rees left the stage for an instrumental version of George Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm”, which acted as a feature for trombonist Harri Archer, recently seen at BMJ as a member of the Full House Brass Band. A rousing, swinging and brassy arrangement also included a feature for alto saxophonist Rhys Ponting.

Roy Hargrove is obviously a great favourite of Collier’s and next up was an arrangement of Hargrove’s composition “Ms. Garvey, Ms. Garvey” featuring raunchy solos from Alex Lloyd on baritone sax, Sarah Mann on trombone and Mike Mason on plunger muted trumpet. There was also a section featuring the massed horns with only Haugen’s drums for company.

Rees returned for an English language version of Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “No More Blues”, a quartet feature introduced by bassist Benedict Stevens. Newman Tai’s piano solo elicited a particularly vociferous cheer from the audience, perhaps some of them had seen him perform with vocalist Debs Hancock the night before.

Rees’ vocalese version of the Wayne Shorter composition “Wild Flower” also acted as a feature for tenor saxophonist Em Craig, who has recently been announced as a finalist in the forthcoming Young Scottish Jazz Musician of the Year competition. The intertwining of Rees’ vocal lines with Craig’s tenor sax was particularly effective, with Craig also proving to be a fluent and imaginative sax soloist.

Rees’ original song “Cafi Bach”, was specifically written for Siglo and appears on the EP. It honours The Cairo, a cafe in Tiger Bay, Cardiff that had been founded by Jamaican immigrants who had come to the UK on the Windrush. Featuring a Welsh language lyric this was a social history in song with Rees’ vocals shadowed by Collier’s plunger muted trumpet.

The set concluded with Rees leading the band on two guaranteed crowd pleasers, “Orange Coloured Sky” and “Sunny” in brash, rousing big band arrangements. “Sunny” was paced by the rapid rhythmic chug of Close’s guitar and included solos from Tai on piano and Collier on trumpet, with the latter also engaging in a series of fiery exchanges with fellow trumpeter Mason.

The deserved encore was an instrumental, an arrangement of the gospel infused “Family Reunion”, a feature for the sax section that saw all five trading solos and phrases.

Once again the Siglo Section had delivered an excellent evening of big band jazz, presenting an impressively broad programme featuring some imaginative arrangements. The band line up includes some excellent individual soloists, but under Collier’s leadership Siglo also impresses overall as a highly accomplished and cohesive ensemble.

The presence of Rees also brought something distinct and different. Yes, she can belt out the big band classics but her original songs and her imaginative adaptations of other material in a Welsh language context was genuinely interesting and innovative.

This was another excellent performance in front of a near capacity audience as the second day of the Wall2Wall Festival ended on a successful note.

 

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