Paul Towndrow on jazz supergroup Atlantic Road Trip: ‘It’s been quite a journey’

With players from Scotland, America, Slovakia and Ireland, Atlantic Road Trip blend disparate musical elements into a sophisticated contemporary jazz aesthetic. It’s a true collaboration, saxophonist Paul Towndrow tells Jim Gilchrist

The Other Fulton Street is in Chicago, or in Glasgow, depending on your point of view. It’s also the title of the terrific opening track on the newly released album, One, by the international jazz collective Atlantic Road Trip, which combines players from Scotland, America, Slovakia and Ireland.

Blending Scots and Slovakian folk elements seamlessly into a sophisticated contemporary jazz aesthetic, the collaboration involves Glasgow alto saxophonist and flautist Paul Towndrow, Chicago-based trumpeter Chad McCullough, The Hague-based Slovakian vibraphonist Miro Herak, Irish bassist Conor Murray and Scots drummer Alyn Cosker.

“It’s been quite a journey,” says Towndrow, speaking from his home in Anniesland, and he doesn’t just mean the band’s very successful US tour from which he recently returned. It began in 2009 when McCullough and Herak struck up a collaborative friendship at Canada’s Banff Center for Arts and Creativity. Shortly before the pandemic, they contacted Towndrow, another long-time acquaintance of Herak’s.

Paul Towndrow, Miro Herak and Chad McCullough of Atlantic Road Trip

“Miro is one of these people who is a real connector,” says the saxophonist. “He always has a great vision of which musicians will work well with other musicians, not just musically but how their personalities might go together on a tour.”

The trio started putting the project together just before the pandemic struck. Then Glasgow Jazz Festival’s director, Jill Roger, asked them if they wanted to do a virtual performance that tied the three of them together, so they enlisted Irish bassist Conor Murray and Scottish National Jazz Orchestra powerhouse drummer Alyn Cosker. That became Atlantic Road Trip – what Towndrow describes as “that seemingly logistical impossibility, a road trip across the Atlantic, contained within the group name.”

The band’s seemingly disparate elements are at the heart of One: “Musical projects and endeavours which are truly collaborative are hard to come by. With Atlantic Road trip I feel we’ve found that balance.”

The 45-year-old Towndrow has been introducing Scottish folk elements into his jazz over the past few years, with convincing results as his last two albums, Deepening the River and Outwith the Circle, testify. But how would his American collaborator – and for that matter US audiences – react to this fusion? On the album, McCullough takes to Towndrow’s reel-based compositions such as Pale Ale or White Cart Water with panache –at times reminiscent of some of Scots trumpeter Colin Steele’s Celtic explorations over the years. Vibraphonist Herak fits in wonderfully, while also contributing his own, folk-based compositions. Plaintive airs, such as the Slovakian Kopala Studienku, or the Phil Cunningham’ composition Cathcart, contrast with the beboppish drive and torrential sax of Upside Down or the acceleration – after a glittering intro – of Fulton Street.

Fulton Street in Chicago, Towndrow explains, houses a venue, gallery and musicians’ collective. It’s also a street near his Anniesland home which boasts a celebrated fish and chip shop.

US audiences reacted enthusiastically to the band, not least to Over Mountain, Under Sky, a major suite for big band and strings they were commissioned to write by Indiana’s Ball State University. They also gave masterclasses at schools and universities and Towndrow, who plays flute and whistles as well as alto sax, was taken aback by the interest in the mellifluous low whistle, a common enough instrument these days in traditional music. “The kids, saxophone players especially, were all saying they wanted to get a low whistle – none of them were talking about wanting to buy an alto saxophone.”

Further US and European tours are scheduled for next year. For Towndrow, who works a lot in community music, not least with the longstanding Byers Road Big Band, the collaboration has been heartening evidence of the power of shared music and culture: “How can we bring our diverse ideas together in a way that cuts to the heart of our shared experience as humans? I hope the music on One will invite the listener to reflect on these questions, as we have done in creating it.”

One is on Calligram Records. See www.paultowndrow.co.uk