Zoe Rahman’s Hull Suite Live was commissioned by Hull Jazz Festival
Zoe Rahman has composed a jazz album based on Hull’s migration history(Image: Lisa indigoburns Wormsley/Submitted)
A jazz pianist has created a new album inspired by Hull’s long migration history. Zoe Rahman’s album – Hull Suite Live – was commissioned by Hull Jazz Festival.
The suite is based on themes of voyage, migration and family, taking inspiration from two statues in Hull – The Crossing located at Humber Quays, and Voyage on Victoria Pier. The first – also known as the Migrant Family Statue – commemorates the 2.2 million people who passed through Hull as a port city between 1836 and 1914. Voyage looks out across the Humber and has a twin sculpture looking back towards it from Iceland, commemorating fishermen, seafarers and trade shared between the two countries.
The music is also about Zoe’s parents’ story of migration, sea crossings and a piano. “When I was writing the music, the themes reminded me of my parents’ story of migration,” Zoe said. “My mother emigrated from England to New Zealand when she was 10, travelling for six weeks by ship. She later met my father when they were both at Sydney University – he had travelled by ship from Bengal.
“I found out only recently that after going back to visit his family in Dhaka, my father needed proof that he had the financial means to support his return to Sydney, so my mother sold her piano so that they could be together. While composing, I was thinking about how my own existence is strongly linked to sea travel and to the story of a piano.”
Zoe has recently been on tour with Hull singer Roland Gift on the Fine Young Cannibals’ 40th anniversary tour. “My association with Hull goes back a long way,” Zoe said. “Not many people know that!”
Zoe’s instrumental interpretations of these topics are overarched with what Jazzwise Magazine described as Zoe’s “full-blooded, chord splashing, orchestral approach to the acoustic piano.” The Hull Suite features drummer Gene Calderazzo (Pharoah Sanders, Randy Brecker) and bassist Alec Dankworth (Abdullah Ibrahim, Dave Brubeck). Longstanding collaborators with Zoe, she joins them on piano. The album was recorded live at The Vortex Jazz Club in London.
Born in the UK, to a Bengali father and English mother, Zoe studied classical piano at the Royal Academy of Music, gained a music degree at Oxford University and then won a scholarship to study jazz performance at Berklee College of Music, Boston. Zoe has become a well-established figure in international jazz. This year marks the 20th anniversary of Zoe receiving a nomination for the Mercury Music Prize.
There will be a live album launch show at The Vortex – where the album was recorded – on July 10. Tickets can be purchased from: https://www.vortexjazz.co.uk/event/zoe-rahman-trio-album-launch-2-shows/
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