Description
Release Date Friday 20th February 2026
All pre-orders will be dispatched/made ready for collection on that day.
Jazz legends Dave Holland and Norma Winstone, together with the versatile
London Vocal Project, present Vital Spark--an album featuring a collection of
Kenny Wheeler's final compositions that were sent over time to Pete Churchill
and brought to life through patient arrangement, deep listening, and mutual
trust
'Vital Spark' captures a rare unity between jazz ensemble and choir, revealing a sound
that's both unforced, delicate, reflective and full of Kenny's character and energy.
The music features new lyrics by Norma Winstone , alongside Wheeler's settings of
poems by Stevie Smith, Lewis Carroll, and William Blake. The result is unmistakably
Kenny Wheeler: lyrical but unsentimental, harmonically rich yet spacious.
For Dave, Norma, and Pete, this project is not a retrospective but a personal, shared
act of remembering and reinterpreting, shaped by decades of friendship,
collaboration, and quiet reverence for one of the most singular voices in modern
music.
Available on hyacinth coloured double LP and digipak CD editions.
Norma Winstone: voice
Dave Holland: bass
Nikki Iles: piano
James Maddren: drums
Mark Lockheart: tenor & soprano saxophone
John Parricelli: guitar (on 'Not Waving But Drowning, Jazzonia, Fuite D'Enfance, Infant
Joy & Heavenly City)
London Vocal Project, Director: Pete Churchill
Tracks: Inner Traces / Will You Walk A Little Faster / Not Waving But Drowning /
Jazzonia / Fuite D'Enfance / Vital Spark / Infant Joy / Heavenly City / These are The
Things We Trust
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