Junction Pool are a collection of twelve young musicians from the Scottish Borders brought together by Harris Playfair who is also Musical Director and pianist with the band. Junction Pool energetically merges musical styles in an uplifting fusion of folk, jazz and funk.
Besides being classical concert pianist, Harris, a Shetlander living in the Borders, has a wonderful rapport with traditional music. He created the Kelso High School Celtic Group, which played at the Scottish Traditional Awards and on STV's hogmanay programme. He was also an official accompanist at the Young Scottish Traditional Musician of the Year and teaches at Newcastle University's Traditional Music course.
Kelso in the Borders is particularly noted for its picturesque beauty, and also for its Salmon Fishing. The Junction Pool is the place where both the rivers Tweed and Teviot join, and serves as an appropriate title for this fourteen piece Celtic Fusion Band.
When starting out, connections with Kelso High School were inevitable, but Harris is keen to point out that this is another musical discovery waiting to happen. “This is a musical amalgam of past and present pupils of the school, some going back ten years, and it also includes other members of the musical community, but they are all united in their love of the interesting and new developments in music and have been gracious enough to allow me to use them as a vehicle for what could be called my own personal musical voice.”
The genesis of this group can be traced back to a particularly unique and legendary enclave of Borders Traditional Music – Alisters Vintage Bar, which has featured in such worthy tomes as “Living Traditional” magazine. The piper James Thomson, flautist Gillian Payne and brass player Cameron Mabon could all be described as the founding members of the group and it was the Saturday night sessions in the Vintage bar which proved to be the launching pad for all ideas, whether genuinely inspirational or downright insane “we used to spend more time thinking of a band name than the music – we started off as the Funky Whippets and were very nearly called the Exploding Mince Orchestra!!”
However the music is where it is at and Harris cites all the major traditional groups as influences…”we used to go to gigs and come away thinking “we could try that..”, I think that we will always be proud of the connection with Kelso and the High School, but in the last three years we have all been working hard to develop the band as an entity in it’s own right.
I believe that this CD is the final part of the maturing process which will now allow Junction Pool to be judged truly on its own merits, and I think I can speak for all of us in saying that we are all very excited at what the future holds.”
“the apotheosis of youth music making at this years (celtic connections) festival”…..Sue Wilson, Sunday Herald
Junction Pool are:
Harris Playfair: keyboards, grand piano
James Thomson: pipes, whistles, vocals
Jamie Young: Pipes vocals, acoustic guitar
Laura Grime: fiddle, vocal
Gillian Payne: flute, vocal
Orren Karp: electric guitar, vocal
John Riley: bass guitar
Ryan Playfair: djembe, percussion
Tamir Karp: drums, trumpet
Charles Dearness: trumpet
Chuck Barton: trumpet
Jo Stark: trompbone
Chris Payne: alto saxophone
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