Join award-winning jazz guitarist and composer Billy Marrows and his 12-piece chamber-jazz ensemble Grande Família to celebrate the release of his debut album ‘Penelope’. Recorded as a surprise present for Billy's mother, this melodic narrative shapes a beautiful evening of original music not to be missed!
"All (album) proceeds go to the World Child Cancer charity which is an excellent reason for purchase, but the music is reward enough"
Jazzwise Magazine
The album was recorded as a surprise for his mother Penny during her struggle with pancreatic cancer in summer 2023. Released in her memory at the end of January 2024, all proceeds are going to World Child Cancer to help children in developing countries beat cancer, raising over £3000 at the time of release.
Their inventive contemporary jazz spans a wide emotional spectrum, with narrative and melody at its heart. Billy’s “preoccupation with melodic directness and harmonic and rhythmic ingenuity” is brought to life with “pastel shaded swags of woodwinds, strings and hushed brass” with “blissfully rising saxophone for a suitably rousing, optimistic finale” (Jazzwise) Music from the album has been played on BBC Radio 3 and Jazz FM plus featured as Song of the Day on All About Jazz.
Billy Marrows is a London-based jazz guitarist and award-winning composer. He leads the Billy Marrows Band, the Billy Marrows Big Band and a new chamber-jazz ensemble Grande Família. Billy is a member of projects across a broad spectrum of the London jazz scene such as Huw V Williams’ Di-Cysgodion, Patchwork Jazz Orchestra and the Tom Ridout Quintet. He has toured in the UK and Europe with Chelsea Carmichael, the Tom Barford Group, OK Aurora and Tom Ridout and has appeared on a number of albums, including Amsterdam-based Sam Newbould’s Bogus Notus and Tom Barford's 'Bloomer’, released on Edition records.
As well as releasing his critically acclaimed debut album in 2024, Billy has more music in the pipeline with the Billy Marrows Band, and played a sold out show with the Billy Marrows Big Band at The Vortex Jazz Club on the last day of the 2023 London Jazz Festival.
Billy won the 2019 Eddie Harvey Jazz Arranger of the Year Award as well as both the small ensemble and big band category of the Dankworth Prize for Jazz Composition in 2016 and 2018 respectively. His composition “Genmaicha” was released by Patchwork Jazz Orchestra on their record “The Light That Shines” and he has been commissioned to write compositions/arrangements for singer-songwriter Hohnen-Ford and Berlin based Fabia Mantwill Orchestra. He wrote a suite for his octet inspired by gamelan for the 2016 Lancaster Youth Jazz Commission and his music has been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and JazzFM. In 2018, Billy studied with Vince Mendoza at the Metropole Orkest Arrangers Workshop in Holland; his arrangement of “Man in the Mirror” was performed at the Lantaren Venster Rotterdam by the Metropole Orkest and Becca Stevens.
An alumnus of the Royal Academy of Music in London, Billy graduated with a first-class degree in jazz guitar performance in 2017. He is grateful for the support of Help Musicians UK, the Sir John Barbirolli Memorial Foundation Grant and the Richard Turner Fund.
Teresa Macedo Ferreira (viola)
Dijan Mbanu (flute)
Gustavo Clayton Marucci (clarinet + bass clarinet)
Chris Williams (alto sax)
Tom Ridout (tenor/soprano sax + clarinet)
Mike Soper (trumpet)
Olli Martin (trombone)
Anna Drysdale (french horn)
Billy Marrows (guitar/baritone guitar + compositions)
Angus Bayley (piano)
Jonas Mbanu (bass)
Tom Potter (drums)