Blue in Green is a monthly night of live jazz at the Gallery Cafe in Bethnal Green where the audience is invited to make art in response to the performances. Our guest this time will be guitarist and award-winning composer/arranger Billy Marrows with his exceptional band.

The Billy Marrows Band brings together several of the UK’s most exciting improvisers to explore Billy’s unique, boundary-pushing compositions. The listener is drawn into a musical world of light and dark, chaos and calm, joy and mystery, where events don’t always unfold as you might expect.

With a broad spectrum of influences including Wayne Krantz, Tim Berne, Craig Taborn, Henry Threadgill and Django Bates, the Billy Marrows Band’s vibrantly melodic, groovy and expressive music explores the relationship between improvised and composed music, generating a fertile playground for these highly creative musicians. Their music incorporates grooves from across the globe and takes inspiration from many genres, including jazz, funk, avant-garde jazz and classical.

Billy Marrows is a guitarist and multi award-winning composer/arranger. He has recently toured the UK with the Tom Barford Group, Tom Ridout's No Excuses Band and Patchwork Jazz Orchestra. Appearing on several albums, Billy was noted as ‘one to watch’ in the Jazzwise review of Tom Barford's album 'Bloomer’, released on Edition records in 2018. Billy has won the 2019 Eddie Harvey Jazz Arranger of the Year Award as well as both the small ensemble and big band category of the Dankworth Prize for Jazz Composition in 2016 and 2018 respectively. In 2018, Billy studied with Vince Mendoza at the Metropole Orkest Arrangers Workshop in Holland and his arrangement of Man in the Mirror was performed by the Metropole Orkest and Becca Stevens.

Line up:
Billy Marrows - Guitar (Tom Barford Group, Patchwork Jazz Orchestra)
Chris Williams - Alto Sax (Led Bib, Let Spin)
Huw V Williams - Bass (HON, Ivo Neame Quintet)
Jay Davis - Drums (Big Bad Wolf, Alex Hitchcock Quintet)

Support will be provided by pianist Alex Chalstrey with his trio. Doors at 7:30, music at 8. Advance tickets £5, OTD £8.