Pianist/composer Django Bates is set to release a new album on 29 March based on the music of Charlie Parker. Titled Belovèd Bird, the 12-track album performed by Bates’ trio of bassist Petter Eldh and drummer Peter Bruun includes Parker repertoire such as lead-off track ‘Scrapple From the Apple’, ‘Hot House’, ‘Laura’, ‘Now’s The Time’ and ‘Billie’s Bounce’.

Bates is releasing the album on his own Lost Marble label and it follows on from his last album for the label, the critically acclaimed Spring Is Here (Shall We Dance?) released in 2008.

Of his new project Bates says: “Having heard Charlie Parker’s music from my birth onwards, I knew it was good in the way that I knew that food was good. It was nutrition: a life force.”

Bates will tour in April and dates include: Band on the Wall, Manchester (8 April), Brewery Arts Centre, Kendal (9 April), CBSO Centre, Birmingham (10 April), The Stables, Milton Keynes (11 April), The Vortex, London (13 April), Lighthouse, Poole (15 April) and South Hill Park Arts Centre, Bracknell (16 April).