Guim's Troupe

La Troupe - el antidoto a la depresión mundial y las resacas anímicas.
¡Guim Garcia-Balasch tiene la solución!
World recession? Guim's got the answer:


Guim's MySpace

Dick Oatts con el Bab

El magnífico saxofonista Dick Oatts actuará con el vibrante Big Acustic band.
Hoy tocamos en el Festival de Jazz de Lleida, mañana en Castellon, y sábado en Ávila. Estamos estrenando música original de Alfons Carrascosa, el lider de la banda. Big Band moderna, esa es la cosa...

Luego, la semana que viene, grabamos un cd.

Press Reviews about Shark

Dry, cutting drum’n’bass. A harsh sound. Brass with the flavour of Isaac Hayes' Shaft and arrangements that sound modern. The trombonist Tom Johnson comes full circle from funk to electronic dance rhythms, passing through 70s blaxploitation and, of course, soul-jazz. Music that ignites both your feet and your brain cells.
Roger Roca, CD Sampler Jazz a Catalunya, November 2008


Fine Arrangements! Roswell Rudd, May 2008

An exceptional quintet on the Catalan scene... A great example of groove provided by powerful drummer, Ramon Rabinad… the tone artist Martí Serra, on tenor, leaves no-one in doubt as to his skill as an improvisor…Guim García shows high class on the alto... the word is: festivo.
Javier Aspiazu, Gara, 17/3/08

Shark, led by english trombonist Tom Johnson along with two saxes and a fat precise and syncopated rhythm section…meaty like a big band…things really got cooking with the drummer doing his Stewart Copeland thing, the pieces pulling in tight to an urban minimal and realighting with a free-style New Orleans aura.
Óscar Cubillo El Correo Digital 14.03.08

Prensa sobre Shark

Drum and bass seco, cortante. Un sonido áspero. Vientos con sabor al Shaft d’Isaac Hayes y arreglos de corte moderno. El trombonista Tom Johnson completa un círculo que va del funk a los ritmos de la música electrónica de baile, pasando por la blaxploitation de los años 70 y, como no, por el jazz más soul. Música que dispara los pies y las neuronas.
Roger Roca, CD Muestra Jazz a Catalunya, Noviembre 2008

Arreglos muy buenos! Roswell Rudd, Mayo, 2008

Se trata de un quinteto de músicos excepcionales de la escena catalana... Un buen ejemplo de groove servido por un poderoso batería, Ramon Rabinad... el entonado Martí Serra, al tenor, dejó ya la impronta de su enorme calidad como improvisador... Guim García destapó su gran clase al saxo alto...Giulia Valle nos dejó, una vez más, apabullados con la contundencia de sus solos y la rotundidad de su sonido...decididamente festivo.
Concierto gratificante de un espléndido grupo, liderado por un trombonista inquieto y creativo capaz de ofrecer una música tan inteligente como divertida.
Javier Aspiazu, Gara, 17/3/08

Shark,… liderada por el trombonista inglés Tom Johnson y completada por dos saxos y una base rítmica gruesa, exacta y sincopada… carnosos como una mini big band…. siguió la cosa con el baterista luciéndose como Stewart Copeland, las piezas recogiéndose hasta lo minimal y urbanita y mechando el aura de Nueva Orleans con free.
Óscar Cubillo El Correo Digital 14.03.08

Email

Hola,

 

Aquí tienes mi nuevo email:

Aquí tens el meu email nou:

Here's my new email:

 

tom@tomjohnson.eu

 

 

XxTom

Working Well

One of the great fallacies of our time is the doctrine that you should always do your best. It’s a simple phrase with benign intentions, but in the mind of an imaginative youngster it can easily be misinterpreted and eventualy lead to frustration.

Of course, we want our children to do well and grow up to be good people. We disapprove of lazyness and shoddy workmanship and we encourage application and honesty. Our children are generally assessed at school according to two general criteria; level and effort, and we tend to reward or punish them according to how they do in the latter.

As a young man, I had assimilated these ideas and I‘d begun to carry them around with me, applying them to what I did and how I lived. But, somehow in the process, I had misconstrued the original message. As a practical guideline, “doing your best” is useful and effective. However, in the process of growing up I converted good advice into a kind of moral doctrine and began dealing in terms of obligation and prohibition. Somehow I got from “Do your best” to “you should always make an effort”. These two assertions may seem familiar but are in fact miles apart in meaning.

Morality is not a practical thing. Unlike good advice, which can be applied pragmatically, a doctrine tells you what you should do; it’s intended to be obeyed always. It becomes the be all and end all and as such is pushed beyond question. So I got to the point where I was applying the doctrine across the board. I was “trying hard” when often this was at best pointless and at worse, obstructive.

I spent hours bashing away at the trombone because I believed that if I didn’t try hard, I wouldn’t get results; as if the good results which I was seeking were some kind of reward for hard work. Regularly, my top lip would go numb - I was pushing so hard against the mouthpiece that I had stopped the bloodflow.

Gradually I’ve come to realise that results come not so much from working hard as from working well. I’m more relaxed now that I can see that getting what I want isn’t a reward granted by some mystical ajudicator only to the ones who deserve it. Its more plainly the result of doing what is required (no less of course, but also no more) in order to reach an objective. So now, if I need to rest then that’s what I do, without suffering a crisis of conscience.

When I see my students contorting themselves (their shoulders, faces, mouths…) I notice that they’re focusing their attention on the wrong place. There’s no question about the effort they’re putting in.

They seem to concentrate on the contact point between the instrument and themselves. I try to advise them instead to attend to what they want: an attractive sound and good intonation. If I manage to get the point across, the student then, without thinking, begins to blow more evenly and to breathe deeper. This reduces tension and as the student relaxes, so the music begins to flow. It becomes easier to do. For so long I had believed that when something seems easy, I must not be trying hard enough. Now, I’m beginning to realise that in fact, the moment when I allow it all just to flow is the moment when I’m working well.