Raymond MacDonald
Raymond MacDonald
 
 

“Music this articulate is rare in any style of music”
- Jazz Wise

Raymond MacDonald is a saxophonist, composer and academic whose work explores the boundaries and ambiguities between what is conventionally seen as improvisation and composition.

Much of his recent performing work has been in collaborative free improvisation contexts, however his roots in jazz and pop music are always evident in his playing and writing. MacDonald collaborates widely and has worked with visual artists, dancers, writers and filmmakers and has produced music for film, television, theatre and the concert hall.

MacDonald has worked internationally with many of the current pioneers in avant-garde music including the sublime US pianist Marilyn Crispell, German drummer Günter ‘Baby’ Sommer, David Byrne, Damo Suzuki from Can, Nurse with Wound, German trumpeter Axel Dorner, US trombonist and educator George Lewis, Japanese Percussionsist Tatsuya Nakatani, US percussionist Michael Zerang, US cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm.

His ambitious International Big Band features the virtuosic Japanese pianist Satoko Fujii, trumpeter Natsuki Tamura, Australians Alistair Spence and Toby Hall and Lloyd Swanton from The Necks and exSonic Youth guitarist Jim O’Rourke among others and in 2010 released, to critical acclaim, Buddy, his first CD on the French label Textile. Buddy was also named in top CDs of year in Wire magazine, Jazzwise and All about Jazz.

“An unqualified Success”
- The Wire

MacDonald has collaborated extensively with the leading lights of the UK avant-garde scene including Evan Parker, Fred Frith, Keith Tippett, Barry Guy, Harry Beckett, Keith Rowe, Lol Coxill, Maggie Nicols, Steve Noble, Steve Beresford, London Improvisers Orchestra and Future Pilot AKA.

He co-leads the imaginative George Burt-Raymond MacDonald Quartet (“leading contemporary Jazz” The Guardian) and is a key player in the formidable musical force that is the Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra (GIO) which runs an annual programme of events at the Centre for Contemporary Arts in Glasgow and has been described as the ‘Premier league of the European improvisation scene.’ (Sudeutsche Zeitung)

MacDonald has toured and broadcast worldwide and his recorded output, which amounts to over 50 releases can be found on a number of international labels including: FMR (UK) | Leo (UK) | Textile (France) | Thrill Jockey (USA) | Matinee (USA) | Clean Feed (Portugal) | Creative Sources (Portugal) | nujazzeurope (Scotland) | Aufgeladen und Bereit (Germany), as well as his own label Iorram, which he runs with fellow GIO members, Neil Davidson and Una MacGlone.

 

 

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“Leading contemporary jazz” - The Guardian

 A former Sunday Herald Scottish Jazz Musician of the Year and a participant in Time Out: Jazz CPD Scotland – a professional development programme for creative jazz musicians living in Scotland, produced by Serious on behalf of the Scottish Arts Council.

In early 2010 MacDonald was the recipient of a prestigious Creative Scotland Vital Spark Award. This allowed him to develop an innovative collaborative project with visual artist Martin Boyce and film director David MacKenzie that experiments with new forms of performative work that will adapt to gallery, concert hall and cinema spaces and was be premiered at the Tramway in Glasgow, in February and October 2012.

MacDonald has extensive experience in cross media collaboration and has worked with writers, visual artists, dancers and filmmakers. He collaborated with David Byrne on David MacKenzie’s film Young Adam and produce orginal music for Nicloas Windin film Valhalla Rising.

He was commissioned to provide music for Martin Boyce’s groundbreaking exhibition Our love is like the Flowers, the Rain, the Sea and the Hours at Glasgow’s Tramway and has also worked with artists Christine Borland on an installation project in Porto, Portugal and 2006 Turner Prize winner Simon Starling where he wrote and performance a new piece for the Opening of The Dundee Centre of contemporary Art.

He has also been commissioned by BBC Radio 3′s Between the Ears and created a work for BMacD5, Martin Boyce and Canadian writer Douglas Copland. Other collaborations include working with Scottish Television to produce a number of sound tracks for Taggert and he wrote and recorded a soundtrack for the National Theatre of Romania production of Children of a lesser God.

 
 

 “Quite astonishingly brilliant” - Jazz Wise

In addition to performing and composing Raymond MacDonald runs workshops and lecturers internationally on issues relating to composition, improvisation, musical education and musical communication.

He is a patron of Drake Music Scotland, was the artistic director of Sounds of Progress, an organisation specialising in working with people with special needs and is currently involved in running Polyphony a music project providing access to musical activities for individuals with mental health problems. 

MacDonald was Head of Music 2013-2016 and Professor of Music Psychology and Improvisation at The University of Edinburgh. Prior to this position he was a Professor in the Psychology Department at Glasgow Caledonian University where he led the Glasgow Caledonian Music Psychology Research Group for 12 years.  

After completing his PhD at the University of Glasgow, investigating therapeutic applications of music, he worked as Artistic Director for a music company, Sounds of Progress, specialising in working with people who have special needs.

His ongoing research focuses on issues relating to improvisation, musical communication, music health and wellbeing, music education and musical identities.

 
 

He studies the processes and outcomes of music participation and music listening and has a particular interest in collaborative creativity. His work is informed by a view of improvisation as a social, collaborative and uniquely creative process that provides opportunities to develop new ways of working musically.

His work also contributes to debates highlighting the ubiquitous importance of music, stressing that everybody has a biological and social guarantee of musicianship. He runs music workshops and lectures internationally and has published over 70 peer reviewed papers and book chapters.

MacDonald has co-edited five texts, Musical Identities (2002) and Musical Communication (2005), Musical Imaginations (2012) and Music Health & Wellbeing (2012), The Handbook of Musical Identities (2016) and was editor of the journal Psychology of Music between 2006 and 2012.

He is an associate editor for The International Journal of Music Education, Jazz Research Journal, Research Studies in Music Education, Musicae Scientiae and The Journal of Music Therapy.

Link to Raymond’s webpage at University of Edinburgh
eca.ed.ac.uk/reid-school-of-music/raymond-macdonald