Sydney-based saxophonist/composer and New York expat Phillip Johnston leads the 8-piece miniature repertory ensemble, The Greasy Chicken Orchestra, through innovative arrangements of jazz of the 1920s and 1930s, as well as his original music reflecting that musical language on their new release, I Cakewalked With a Zombie. This long-evolving project continues Johnston’s exploration of the history of orchestration and composition-focussed ensembles, such as The Microscopic Septet, Big Trouble, and The Silent Six.

The group consists of a four-saxophone front line and rhythm section, featuring leading jazz artists from Sydney. The music leaves room for individual expression of its unique soloists and aims to express a combination of freedom and discipline, a love of jazz history and creativity, and the infectious rhythm, mystery and sheer joy of the jazz of this era.

"Johnston has always understood that jazz's history is a rich resource rather than a liability, and with this band he immerses himself almost completely in this era of energised and good-humoured dance music. . . a nuanced and blended sonority, combined with an emphasis on pinpoint arrangements and concise solos."
–John Shand, Sydney Morning Herald

Within that style, the repertoire traverses a wide variety of this rich time period, from New Orleans trad (Jelly Roll Morton and Louis Armstrong/Lil Hardin) to tight small ensemble arrangements (John Kirby Sextet) to the great early small big bands (Ellington, Don Redman), as well as modern arrangers, Forrester, Dasent & Johnston, which pay homage to the music of this era and turn it inside out.

The band is led by Phillip Johnston, an American saxophonist-composer who lives in Sydney while still maintaining a musical life in his hometown of New York City. His original music and arrangements range from the traditional to the avant garde, and his homage/re arrangement projects have featured the music of diverse artists including Jelly Roll Morton, Thelonious Monk, Steve Lacy and Captain Beefheart.

“Saxophonist/composer Phillip Johnston’s music embodies all that’s good about jazz. It’s honest, original, and inspired, above and beyond the typical. It’s also some of the very smartest and best-humored music to have found a home under the jazz banner.” ––Chris Kelsey, Jazziz.


Phillip Johnston discusses the project:

The musicians in Australia are some of the greatest in the world, and I’ve had the amazing good fortune to play with many of these great musicians here since I arrived in Sydney. Any band, whether it be the Duke Ellington Orchestra or The Beatles, or The Microscopic Septet, is most importantly an amalgamation of different musical personalities, and the GCO has personalities in spades.

Peter Dasent, film composer, leader of The Umbrellas, and exponent/illuminator of the music of Nino Rota, who arranged In A Mist on this CD, totally gets the style and feel of piano playing that goes with the music and is really like a co-leader of the band. Tim Rollinson, guitar and banjo, also leads his own bands and is a shimmering chameleon of musical styles. Multi-instrumentalist James Greening is a Sydney legend and an Australian national treasure, whether playing trombone, pocket trumpet, tuba sousaphone or diddly bow bass. Nic Cecire, drums, plays on almost everything I do, from silent film scores, to funk to jazz: he is a consummate musician and stylist, and he reads like the wind.

The three other saxophonists, Peter Farrar, Tim Clarkson and Jim Loughnan, each have their own individual sounds and styles: Peter’s angular virtuosity, Tim’s soulful hard swinging and Jim’s thoughtful and lyrical approach. All of these modern musicians bring their own experience and style to this music, yet really get to the heart of this era and this body of work. It’s a gift to play with them and to hear them.

After years of existing first as a pick-up band and then as a rehearsal band, the GCO slowly evolved through a long residency at Peter Rechniewski’s Foundry 616, into a repertory band that combined new arrangements of historical tunes, and originals which celebrate that musical language. By the time we went into the studio with Phil Punch at 301 Studios, I think we had been ready for a long time.