Testimony Liner Notes

Back in the Spring of 2004, Peter Woods needed to hire a piano player for a pub gig in Smiths Falls, Ontario, where he also preaches at Trinity United Church.

He had read an article in the Ottawa Citizen describing some jazz piano guy named Brian Browne. The article was about Browne's quasi-retirement after a long career in Canada and the United States. Browne was cutting back, just wanted an odd job here and there.

Come back home. Sit on the verandah, play when you feel like it. Been out there a long time. Since the fifties. Some good times, some not so good. Browne is as old and as good as the hills of the Ottawa Valley, his home. And, if you listen, just as calm and sweet and wise and witty.

Saxman Preacher Woods didn't know it but he was about to be tied up with THE Brian Browne, one of the finest jazz pianists in North America.

In the article, Browne had stated that he was open to working with local musicians. Preacher Woods called him and boldly booked him for a gig in a popular little joint named Rob Roy's on the Rideau Canal in Smiths Falls.

Audience capacity for the duet? Small.

How these things start? You never know.

There's what you call your leap of faith, here. By both of them. The leap has led to a warm friendship, conversations about the street and the spirit, an ongoing masterclass in jazz theory, and some great, great gigs.

Their musical partnership is defined by easy interaction over familiar tunes: medium swing, blues and ballads.

It sounds oh so straightforward but regularly fresh magic emanates in the midst of these classic melodies.

Browne instructs that the music always works best when it's being played as honestly as possible, taking all the risks, as it were.

Put Browne, who's been around the block a few times, with relative newcomers Woods, who is breathlessly creative and growing b the moment, and you've got a fascinating combination of interactive energy, the opposite poles of two magnets.

Talent will out. Always does.

No matter the tune or the tempo, their music reminds that there's no line between what's sacred and what's secular. Songs such as "What a Wonderful World" and "Come Sunday" speak to blessings between artises and friends.

The music always stays loose and intimate, conversational, spontaneous, friendly, quiet and reflective but periodically combusting with energy and humorously erupting into playful debate.

Mastermixer Riley Starr blends and allows the intimate touches: ghost sounds of the sax keys and reeds, light whisper of piano's damper, the occasional murmur of Browne's voice as he accompanies his solos.

Says Preacher Woods humbly, "... an opportunity for me to lay down some simple melodic statements overtop Brian's lyrical and harmonic musings".

Well, it's more than that, boys.

What with Woods sounding somewhere in-between Coleman Hawkins and Lester Yound, say Ben Webster, and Browne being all Browne with little flavours of George Shearing or Art Tatum, it's much, much more than that.

They found one another by luck. Now we're the lucky ones.

A cordial welcome to Testimony!

Brian Doyle - Canadian Author