About Me
Ian Smith has been playing trumpet since he was fifteen. He has studied with Joe Csibi (principal trumpet in the Irish National Symphony Orchestra) and Bobby Shew (Buddy Rich, Horace Silver bands) as well as learning harmony from Trevor England (ex-Berklee). As a bass he was a Vocal Scholar of the College of Music and a Choral Scholar of Christchurch Cathedral, Dublin. There is a strong tradition of trumpet playing in Smith's family, his grandfather Chick Smith played in many British dance bands from the 1930s onwards and his cousin Jimmie Deuchar was at the forefront of British bop as well as playing in the Clarke/Boland Big Band.He has guested on albums by highly established Irish songwriters like Luka Bloom and Mick Hanley. He joined post-punk band the Real Wild West in the late 80s and gigged frequently with them for three years, including playing the Eurorock Festival '87 in Frankfurt, the Mean Fiddler in London and supporting Echo and the Bunnymen and the Pogues in Ireland. The Real Wild West single was produced by Pogues Shane MacGowan and Philip Chevron; the album was produced by John Langford of The Mekons.Ian Smith appeared at the Cork International Jazz Festival in 1988 and 1989, playing a set with saxophonist Richie Cole in '89. He has been involved in duo and trio gigs with guitarist Louis Stewart. He moved over to London in 1990 and in May '91 co-founded the group Forest which quickly became established on the London freeform scene. He was a sometime member of the Screech Owls, a rock band which featured former Virgin Prune Dik Evans, which performed at the Mean Fiddler.Since 1992 he has been playing improvised music and has performed with Derek Bailey, Evan Parker, John Stevens, Maggie Nicols, Lol Coxhill, Steve Beresford and Eddie Prévost among others. His own trio, Trian, has played at the 1993 London Experimental Music Festival and the 1992 Soho Jazz Festival. He also participated in a reformation of Cornelius Cardew's Scratch Orchestra in the ICA in 1994. He has collaborated with composer Roger Doyle, winner of the Bourges International Elecro-Acoustic Music Competition 1997, and he has been featured on two instrumental tracks by the hip hop band Marxman. He toured the UK with Butch Morris' London Skyscraper conduction project in November 1997. In 1998 he founded the London Improvisers Orchestra with Parker and Beresford, which continues to play once a month. Recent highlights include playing with Burnt Sugar in London and Brighton in 2005, and a new occasional Trio K3 with New York drummer Harris Eisenstadt and French resident bassist Simon H Fell(so can be tricky to get together!).
