Ant Law & Brigitte Beraha / Ensconced
Release Date: 16th August 2024
CD, Digital & Vinyl Formats / UBU0169
Brigitte Beraha & Ant Law (Photographer: Rob Blackham)
Ubuntu Music is delighted to announce the signing of the duo, guitarist Ant Law and vocalist Brigitte Beraha, for the release of Ensconced, their debut album on Ubuntu Music.
Ant and Brigitte explain: “‘Ensconced’ has a cozy, autumnal feeling. It is focused on the sound of Brigitte’s voice and Ant playing steel-string acoustic guitar. On recent projects Brigitte has experimented with electronics and effects - but here we hear her directly, sat around the campfire…”
Ant Law & Brigitte Beraha (Photographer: Rob Blackham)
They continue, describing their music: “We invite you in with the sweet ‘A Kiss To Build A Dream On’, followed by five new original songs and one reinterpretation of an earlier composition, ‘Harvest’, in which Brigitte sings wordlessly. The album gathers velocity as it progresses and there are guest appearances from Kit Downes, Petros Klampanis, Matt Calvert, Million Square and more. It closes with Bernstein’s ‘Some Other Time’ - once again performed as a duo, just as the album opened.”
Ant shares his view on their new relationship with Ubuntu Music: “I’ve worked successfully with Ubuntu on a number of releases as a sideman in recent years. Their catalogue has grown significantly with more and more established artists coming on board. I’m very pleased to join their roster and hope that the success continues!”
Martin Hummel, Director of Ubuntu Music, concludes: “We’ve had the pleasure of working with Ant on a number of projects, including most recently with the outstanding Trio HLK album. And we first began working with Brigitte with the Solstice release in 2021. So, it seems as if destiny was calling for ‘Ensconced’ to join our Family. It’s a beautiful album that demonstrates their talent and their musical diversity. We’re happy to be a part of it.”
For further information, please contact:
Ant Law (Artist): AntLawGuitar@gmail.com
Martin Hummel/Ubuntu Music (Worldwide): martin@ubuntumanagementgroup.com
BIOGRAPHIES
ANT LAW
British guitarist Ant lives in London and is “a game changer” according to The Guardian. His 5th album ‘Same Moon in the Same World’ (Outside in Music) was released on 4th November 2022.
Same Moon is a collaboration between Ant and the brilliant saxophonist & composer Alex Hitchcock. Recorded in 2020/2021 across multiple continents, bridging the gap between London, Amsterdam and New York, it brings together a stellar cast of guest musicians performing new compositions: vibraphonist Joel Ross, bassists Linda May Han Oh, Ben Williams and Jasper Høiby, and drummers Jeff Ballard, Kendrick Scott, Sun-Mi Hong and Eric Harland.
The Same Moon quartet toured in Europe in December 2022: Ant, Alex Hitchcock (saxophone), Conor Chaplin (bass) and Jeff Ballard (drums) who appears on the album. In February & March 2023 Ant and Alex are toured with Jasper Høiby (bass) and Sun-Mi Hong (drums), both of whom also feature on the album. Tour booking is underway for this lineup throughout 2024.
The pandemic hit in the middle of The Sleeper Wakes European tour. London was locked-down and Ant began collaborating on a series of remote recordings with a range of artists across the globe. This evolved into weekly livestreams in which he broadcast the collaborative music videos and interviewed the guests. It is entitled “QZ” - which stands for Quarantine Zone. These streams were ongoing on the last Thursday of every month on YouTube, facebook & Twitch - but now that live performances are back they have stopped.
In 2013 his debut 'Entanglement' (33Jazz) was released, followed by 'Zero Sum World' (Whirlwind Recordings) in 2015 and then 'Life I Know' (Edition Records) in 2018. This release was described as “career-defining”. It achieved 5 star reviews, made numerous “best of 2018" lists, received airplay in the UK, Europe, Australia, and was added to numerous editorial playlists on Spotify. 2020 saw the release of Ant’s 4th album - the critically acclaimed ‘The Sleeper Wakes’ (Edition).
In addition to leading his own projects, Ant plays in Tim Garland's band with Jason Rebello & Asaf Sirkis, featuring on albums 'Songs To The North Sky', 'Return To The Fire' & 'ONE' which was shortlisted for a Grammy and won the Jazzwise Best Album award.
Ant is also the “L” in Trio HLK who record/tour with Dame Evelyn Glennie. He has worked with other notables Cory Henry, Thomas Gould and is featured in “Total Guitar", “Guitar Techniques" & “Guitarist” magazines. In the latter he was included in a list of “10 Astounding Virtuosos”, and the May 2021 issue of Guitar Techniques features a 2-page spread on Ant, and a 9/10 review of The Sleeper Wakes.
2016 saw the emergence of the Art Of Rhythm Trio featuring Matt Ridley (bass) and Asaf Sirkis (drums & konnakol). In April/May they played a 20-date tour all over the UK, supported by the Arts Council. They had played together in a different ensembles but the tour allowed them to consolidate their musical relationships and develop the trio dynamic. Most notable perhaps is the inclusion of Indian classical elements (check out this video) such as konnakol, the South-Indian spoken percussion, amidst all the jazz. This video features the rarely sighted Art Of Rhythm expanded into quintet formation.
Ant was born in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where he lived until the age of 16. From a young age he was exposed to early blues and rock 'n' roll, as well as Arabic music. He began playing classical piano and guitar around the age of 8. Throughout his teens he gravitated towards the guitar. A history teacher gave him a video of Stevie Ray Vaughan playing live at the El Mocambo, which was a huge influence, along with videos of Guns 'n' Roses, Queen, and later on Joe Satriani and Steve Vai.
Law studied Physics on a scholarship at Edinburgh University. In the summer before his final year there he completed a summer semester at Berklee College Of Music, Boston. This he says was crucial because he heard gospel music and gospel drummers for the first time, and lots of Latin American music. As he continued with the Physics degree he became obsessed with jazz and played his first jazz gigs. By this point he had discovered and started using Perfect 4ths tuning for the guitar. In a case of convergent evolution, other players (like Stanley Jordan, Tom Quayle) had also discovered and were using this same tuning. Allan Holdsworth has said that if he could start again, he would tune this way. Ant wrote a book introducing the tuning entitled “3rd Millenium Guitar" which is published by Mel Bay.
Since 2010 Ant has concentrated on make a living playing guitar, eventually moving to London and immersing himself in the scene there and touring internationally. He has also lived in NYC for a season where he studied with his heroes Ari Hoenig, Ben Monder, Adam Rogers, Lage Lund, Johannes Weidenmueller, Tim Miller and others.
Website: https://www.AntLaw.co.uk/
BRIGITTE BERAHA
Born in Milan to a Turkish father and Turkish-British mother, Beraha grew up on the Côte d’Azur in France where her first music memories are of sitting and listening to her dad play piano and sing. This musical, multinational and multilingual upbringing combined to inspire and shape one of the most creative vocalists and composers on the UK scene.
Embracing a wide variety of music influences and genres, from jazz and Latin to classical and, more recently, electronic, Beraha’s sound is free and fluid with an emphasis on exploration and expression. Fearlessly testing the limits of the voice as instrument, her sound is distinguished by the unexpected, with free improvisation and evocative wordless singing at its core.
This agility, adventurous spirit and limitless imagination all mark her out as a truly exciting and versatile artist with a huge range of experience and creative scope.
She has worked with a wide range of musicians and recorded a number of critically acclaimed albums. Her first solo work By the Cobbled Path (2021) has seen her unending curiosity explore electronic sounds and effects further still, to compliment and accentuate the dream-like quality of her compositions. This album marks the next stage of Beraha’s ever-exciting journey as composer, vocalist and lyricist. Her 5th album as a leader ‘Blink’ (2022), the follow up to Lucid Dreamers (2020) where she is joined by top-class London musicians George Crowley, Alcyona Mick & Tim Giles, was released on 20th May 2022 with a 13-date UK/ European tour supported by Arts Council England, the band’s first touring opportunity since forming in 2020. They are now embarking on another run of dates and plan to record their third album for a release in late 2023.
Previous albums, Prelude to a Kiss (FMR, 2005) and Flying Dreams (F-Ire, 2008), equally reveal the constant movement and development of Beraha as an artist. The former, a combination of jazz standards and originals, attests to her love for jazz and latin standards while also setting the tone for her trademark contemporary and ethereal sound, enhanced by the saxophone of Ingrid Laubrock. The second is a more personal collection of original compositions, influenced by Anglo-European and Latin jazz as well as Brigitte’s own cosmopolitan upbringing.
Website: https://www.BrigitteBeraha.com/
