Green Prism
music composed by Keith Tippett
arranged by Hilary Jeffery
lyrics by Julie Tippetts
RELEASE DATE
29 May 2026
Julie Tippetts - voice
Tobias Delius - reeds
Paul Dunmall - reeds
Hilary Jeffery - brass
Eleni Poulou - synth
AUDIO PREVIEW ↓
“Green Prism” is a recording that will not only engross anyone already familiar with Keith Tippett’s music; it will hopefully bring him to the attention of a new generation of those with mind’s open enough to appreciate the best of contemporary composition.Martin Phillips
PRESS RELEASE by Martin Phillips“Green Prism” is at once a tribute to a master of composition in his maturity and a sensitive re-imagining by someone from a new generation discovering a way to celebrate the spirit of Keith Tippett. It’s a recording that will engross anyone who has loved Keith’s music.“Green Prism” is a re-working of the final composition of the jazz musician Keith Tippett, who died in 2020. This new work has been arranged by Hilary Jeffery. It will be released on Discus Music in May 2026.After attending a Keith Tippett/Louis Moholo-Moholo concert in Berlin in 2017, Jeffery approached Tippett to write a piece for the Berlin based brass group, Zinc and Copper. The resulting suite – “Winter’s Welcome” – was premiered in Berlin in February 2019. Keith’s health had by then deteriorated and so sadly he never heard the piece performed live. After his death in 2020, Jeffery resolved to take the music and record it anew. The result is “Green Prism”.The music on the album is not an exact recreation of Tippett’s score for the Zinc and Copper ensemble. Jeffery has re-worked the arrangements for multi-track brass plus the voice of Julie Tippetts, the saxophone of Paul Dunmall, Tobias Delius’s clarinet and Eleni Poulou’s synthesizer.It’s difficult not to feel that these last compositions by Tippett reflect an artist aware that his work was drawing to a close. In particular, the three tracks “In Breath”, “One Year On” and “The Sigh” offer a reflective musical triptych.Jeffery’s arrangement of “In Breath” is a perceptive revisiting of the original chart. There are the dense chords and harmonies familiar to anyone who has encountered Tippett’s work before. Paul Dunmall’s soulful saxophone weaves its way around Julie Tippetts’ poetry-song.“One Year On” is painfully beautiful. Julie ruminates on the void that Keith’s death has left in her life. Time doesn’t ease the hurt: “my eyes are full to brimming, one year on” she sings, over the sombre brasses.The record ends on “The Sigh”, which as far as is known, is the last piece Keith ever wrote, a ballad in which he encoded the message “I love you Julie”. In this wordless version, Paul Dunmall’s saxophone has gone. There is no Julie. We leave the record with just the brass sounding the final farewell.“Green Prism” is a recording that will not only engross anyone already familiar with Keith Tippett’s music; it will hopefully bring him to the attention of a new generation of those with mind’s open enough to appreciate the best of contemporary composition.
TRACKS ↓“A Song About Gloves”
K.Tippett, J.Tippetts, arr H.JefferyJulie Tippetts – voice
Paul Dunmall – tenor saxophone
Hilary Jeffery – brass“Dancing”
K.Tippett, J.Tippetts, arr H.JefferyJulie Tippetts – voice
Tobias Delius – tenor saxopohone
Paul Dunmall – C soprano saxophone
Hilary Jeffery – trombones, computer“Green Prism Parthers”
K.Tippett, J.Tippetts arr H.JefferyTobias Delius – clarinet
Hilary Jeffery – brass
Eleni Poulou – synthesizer, music box“In Breath”
K.Tippett, J.Tippetts, arr H.JefferyJulie Tippetts – voice
Paul Dunmall – tenor saxophone
Hilary Jeffery – brass“Thoughts”
K.Tippett, arr H.JefferyTobias Delius – clarinet, tenor saxophone
Paul Dunmall – melodica
Hilary Jeffery – brass, melodica
Eleni Poulou – synthesizer, melodica
Julie Tippetts – voice“Green Prism – The Rock”
K.Tippett, J.Tippetts, arr H.JefferyJulie Tippetts – voice
Paul Dunmall – tenor saxophone
Hilary Jeffery – trombone, brass
Eleni Poulou – synthesizer“One Year On”
K.Tippett, J.Tippetts, arr H.JefferyJulie Tippetts – voice
Hilary Jeffery – brass“The Sigh”
K.Tippett, arr H.JefferyHilary Jeffery – trombones
Hilary Jeffery
Green Prism
29 May 2026Discus 197 CDmusic composed by Keith Tippett, arranged by Hilary Jefferylyrics by Julie Tippettsperformed by:Julie Tippetts, Tobias Delius, Paul Dunmall, Hilary Jeffery, Eleni Pouloumulti-track brass played and recorded at Berlintune Studio by Hilary Jeffery (2021 – 2024)Julie Tippetts, Paul Dunmall, Eleni Poulou, Hilary Jeffery recorded at J&J Studio, Bristol by Jim Barr (2024)Tobias Delius, Eleni Poulou recorded at Lowswing Studio, Berlin by Guy Sternberg (2025)mixed at Berlintune Studio by Hilary Jeffery (2024 – 2025)final mix and master by Guy Sternberg at Lowswing Studio (2025)design and layout by Sven Sorićproduced by Hilary JefferyDiscus Music
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Rayanza Records
Review by Steve DayGod knows, 2020 was a year of sorrow for so many people. If only we really knew. How can any of us know, have knowledge of the godhead, articulate the truth of it? Too many pretenders like to come forward and tell us their secrets.
Like most of his friends, for me, Keith Tippett’s death wasn’t easy, still isn’t. As for Julie, then, now and ever more, that huge passing was truth laid bare in all it’s hard, hard uncompromising detail; a stark living to die with finality. Of course, what any Unlonely Raindancer has to endure is basically the way of things. Martin Phillip’s sleeve notes to Green Prism quotes ‘the calm resignation’ of the poet Edward Thomas: The unfathomable deep/Forest where all must lose/Their way. For today, maybe that’s as close as any secret insight gets; the losing of the Tao.These days I refuse to write for anyone other than myself. I don’t assume I know the minds of other men and women. What I can say is Paul Dunmall’s new Discus album is titled Afraid To Speak, that maybe so. Yet Hilary Jeffery’s take on Keith’s Green Prism, allows Paul’s saxophones to provide a strong grip on reality. His playing folds out of the score with such resilience and beauty it can only come from one who has braved the unfathomable.I now live a stone’s throw from Dartington, where Hilary Jeffrey first encountered Keith Tippett’s summer school sessions. These days the place contains less febrile creativity, nevertheless it still holds something of a Green Prism quality. Like the gardens, these two ‘takes’ on the multifaceted music are an all-angular, pulsing of nature and nurturing. Julie Tippetts’ voicings double meaning in The Rock with a secure and solidifying maturity. This isn’t some ethereal chanteuse warbling spells; instead we’re fused into the dark soul of the bewitched, literally a Blueprint of experience at the rockface. It longs for nothing… Repeat, it longs for nothing… lists sleep, but longs for nothing, only to segue into One Year On, an incredibly painful song of absolutely nothing else but longing for past love.Green Prism is a sharply drawn journey, albeit that the personnel is restricted to trios and duos, plus a quartet and a quintet (the superb Thoughts based on the theme of one of Keith’s greatest hits, Thoughts To Geoff.)Hilary Jeffery has resisted the temptation to put a piano in the mix. Personally, Keith Tippett avoided electricity. I can’t help thinking though, he would have approved of Eleni Poulou’s judicious use of synthesizer on three of these tracks. Wisely, Mr Jeffery has kept the arrangements sparsely spontaneous, almost hollow and very, very musical.There never was any pretence about Keith Tippett’s intentions and Hilary Jeffery’s curve on Green Prism is such a satisfying tribute to the sensitivity of these scorings. Ah Keith, love yer Danny Boy!Steve Day, May 2026
