Dave Holland – Bass

There is always something interesting going on with Holland’s compositions. There are no contracts here. The tunes are blues drenched but there are no lazy 12-bar heads. This composition has a strange ‘limp’ in the form. Each three bar sequence reads 3:4/4:4/3:4. The extra beat in the middle bar creates this interesting tension. Masterful stuff.

The tune is called ‘Make Believe’ and is from the 1999 Dave Holland Quintet album, ‘Prime Directive’. This is the studio version of the piece (there is a live version on the ‘Extended Play’ CD that came out in 2003). The interest is in the music not in the chops. There are two sections where I am not confident that I have got it right (I have labelled them) – I jsut can’t ‘feel’ where the notes are supposed to lie. The chart has value for all it’s faults.