Colin Steele: Stramash II

Scottish trumpeter and composer Colin Steele returns with his jazz-meets-folk ensemble for another round of boundary-spanning music where technique meets heart and soul.

Steele has been a mainstay of Scotland's jazz scene for more than two decades, with recent albums exploring music outside the jazz canon. His interpretations of tunes by Scots emo pop legends The Blue Nile (Marina Records, 2025) drew wide praise, as did Joni (Marina Records, 2020), his collection from the Joni Mitchell songbook. He received the inaugural Brian Kellock Best Instrumentalist Award at the 2025 Scottish Jazz Awards. Still, his most fondly regarded project may be Stramash (Gadgemo Records, 2009). Imagined in the mid-2000s as "jazz quintet, string quartet and bagpipes," the group blended traditional folk, jazz and classical elements, gigged, recorded an album, and then went into a long hibernation.

In 2023 Fiona Alexander, director of the Edinburgh International Jazz & Blues Festival, suggested a one-off reunion concert. It was a roaring success and led to support for a follow-up. Stramash II brings back many of the original players performing new Steele compositions in arrangements by pianist Dave Milligan.

"Stramash," a Scots word meaning uproar or commotion, usually involves a group of people and is not necessarily negative. Here it signals both place and players. The music ranges from wistful to bucolic to lively to, at times, genuinely uproarious. The opening "Declaration of Arbroath" begins with a stately, gentle tune evoking history. The declaration itself was a 1320 letter from Scottish lairds to the pope asking him to recognize Scotland as an independent nation, still cherished by those seeking modernday emancipation.

Steele wrote this section in Arbroath Abbey and conjures a misty procession before pizzicato strings introduce a genteel dance that shifts into a lightly swinging jazz passage with strong solos from Steele on trumpet and Phil Bancroft on tenor saxophone. Momentum builds as the strings return, joined by pipes, for a final thematic statement. It's nine minutes of varied, inspiring music.

Much of the album was written around Elgin in the northeast of Scotland (whisky country). "Elgin Laddie" combines five lively reels by Steele with sharp, Grappelli-tinged violin from Seonaid Aitken, the strings bounding along. "Covesea Bay" gives Milligan room to dance at the piano, supported by the "Scottish National Rhythm Section" of Calum Gourlay on bass and Alyn Cosker on drums. "Benromach," inspired by the revived whisky distillery, builds a fine pipe melody through jazz and folk sections to a glorious finish.

"Fergus," sparked by listening to acclaimed pianist and composer Fergus McCreadie, is a shuffling, multilayered piece with space for drum and bass features (Gourlay in top form) and a swaying trumpet solo before the strings add further intrigue. The closing "Bangers and Stramash," a punning nod to sausages and mashed potatoes, almost gets funky, with Bancroft "giving it laldy," as we say in Scotland, in a roaring tenor solo.

Stramash II is a worthy next chapter in a very Scottish musical journey. Fans will hope they do not have to wait another 20 years to hear what comes next.