Vlaams Radio Orkest . Alejo Pérez

Things were once very different, but nowadays England is again a musical force to be reckoned with. In addition to Thomas Adès, Mark-Anthony Turnage (b. 1960) is undoubtedly one of the most controversial composers in the British Isles. While he had already experimented with jazz and rock music in such compositions as 'Kai' (1990), 'Your Rockaby' (1993) and 'Blood on the Floor' (1995), in 'Scorched' he was even more ambitious. This highly-praised composition, written on commission to the Frankfurt Radio-Sinfonie-Orchester in 2002, is an extended, fourteen-part suite full of extremely personal adaptations of John Scofield's labyrinthine jazz compositions. With the backing of an impressive orchestral machine including a big band and a jazz trio, the cunning Turnage enters the no man's land between jazz and classical music. 'Scorched', whose title was distilled from the phrase 'SCofield reORCHEstrateD', is a chameleonic phantasmagoria that meanders between vivid Stravinsky and clinical Miles Davis, between exaggerated Tchaikovsky and syrupy film music. A musical feast to stimulate the ear.