The fertile, sometimes fevered, imagination of Django Bates has always unearthed odd angles on the most hackneyed of material – Sinatra’s ‘My Way’ will never sound the same – but his lovingly crafted tribute to Charlie Parker took many listeners by surprise. Reaffirming not just Bates’ pianistic prowess but also visiting untouched depths within Bird’s music, Andy Robson finds Bates beaming about its follow up, his fruitful life as an educator and the potential reunion of a certain 1980s Brit Jazz supergroup

No, Django Bates isn’t opening a fruit and veg shop. Times may be hard in the jazz world but the composer, pianist and all-round icon hasn’t yet had to turn greengrocer. His front room may be chocker with the wooden trays you recognise from a fruiterer’s front window, but these are overflowing with the fruits of other labours. Bates uses the trays as a filing system and scores, sketches and ideas from, oh, 30 years in the business, tumble and peek from between the wooden slats.

“See the avocado box? It’s really good for A4 manuscript paper,” he notes, with his usual smile, while weightier tomes from concertos to big band pieces lurk in larger boxes where plums and pears once leaned together. Bates is having a sort out. It comes with the territory of his hectic professional and domestic life style. The wonder isn’t that his filing system is, well, different, but that he’s able to find time to organise anything at all.

This is an extract from Jazzwise Issue #167 – to read the full article click here to subscribe and receive a FREE CD...

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