Fred Thomas, Benoit Delbecq & Ewan Bleach - Dick Wag: A Tribute To Richard Wagner (2021)

'Dick Wag - a Tribute to Richard Wagner' is a new trio dedicated to the notorious German composer, despised and idolised in equal measure. This 'tribute band' attempts the impossible: to reconcile itself with opera's most depraved, politically divisive and love-hated little man. Dealing with a composer that invites extreme reactions, this ensemble, comprised of the most unlikely collaborators, reduces music composed on a monumental scale to the intimacy of three.

With huge, dramatic scenes boiled down to discreet miniatures - each expressed on a single piece of paper and treated like found objects as a jazz musician might - the resulting improvisations teeter surreally between the playful lyricism of swing and the abstraction of modernist prepared piano grooves.

Composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist Fred Thomas has contrived these respectfully profane interpretations of Wagner's sublime, bombastic, time-stopping, sexually suggestive and earth-shatteringly beautiful creations by assembling a seemingly dysfunctional trio of motley talents. Parisian prepared-piano legend Benoit Delbecq's child-like and profoundly vocal outbursts miraculously synthesise with Ewan Bleach's unparalleled sense of melody and tone, glued together by Fred Thomas' foundational bass playing. Sonically, there are reminiscences of the great chamber jazz trio of Jimmy Giuffre, Paul Bley and Steve Swallow.

Benoît Delbecq – prepared piano
Ewan Bleach – reeds
Fred Thomas – double bass