Mark-Anthony Turnage
Blood On The Floor

THE REVIEW

It's a tough life for a classical composer if you are born in England. In the land of the Beatles and the Stones, people look at you strangely if your references are Britten or Harvey (for example) instead of Lennon-McCartney. So, you need to come up with something to earn your bread and audience. In "Blood on the Floor", written in 1993-96, Mark-Anthony Turnage shakes things up by pairing a traditional chamber ensemble with a jazz trio, originally composed of John Scofield (guitar), Martin Robertson (sax), and Peter Erskine (drums).

The result is a broad piece (68 minutes) divided into nine parts, entirely instrumental and of a hybrid nature, being well-positioned sometimes on the tracks of contemporary writing and other times on those of fusion sounds.

The title is borrowed from a painting by Francis Bacon, which suggested the initial musical images to Turnage; but the blood on the floor mainly refers to the theme of drugs and addiction as testified by the titles of certain sections of the piece: "Junior Addict" or "Needles", or also "Elegy for Andy", the composer's younger brother who died from an overdose.

Thus, the work is constructed in panels, with a marked slow/fast alternation in the various episodes where the instrumental ensemble is always different and has four solo moments assigned, in the subsections, to horn, flute, trombone, and a trumpet duet. For the rest, the main role is played by guitar, sax, and drums, which integrate effectively with the rest of the orchestral group.

"Blood on the Floor" is therefore a successful example, more than contamination between musical genres, of coexistence between different and historically characterized languages. An interesting listen for those who dislike barriers in today's music, be it contemporary or jazz. And for those who side with a composer (of classical music?) born in the land of Albion.