Mama Terra ‘Chameleons: Live Interpretations of Herbie Hancock’ (LP/CD) [PRE-ORDER]

£12.00 – £23.00

Album Format

*PRE-ORDER / RELEASES 14 FEBRUARY, 2025*

Following the acclaim of Mama Terra’s 2023 debut album The Summoned (“Bursts with zeal and vigour” **** MOJO), today Acid Jazz announce details of the group’s new album Chameleons (Live Interpretations Of Herbie Hancock), a tribute to major influence on their work, Herbie Hancock.

Approached by long-time supporters Jazz FM to pick an album to recreate for their ‘Classic Album’ series, Mama Terra’s leader and pianist Marco Cafolla’s gut instinct was to select Herbie Hancock’s 1973 groundbreaking jazz-funk and fusion masterpiece, Head Hunters.

“Herbie was so influential to my own playing and writing, and the Head Hunters record has truly been worn out with how many times I’ve listened to it since I can remember,” says Cafolla. “We had to recreate this iconic music with Mama Terra, but also make it our own, give it the respect and attention it deserves and we did not want to deviate away from the source too much as it’s literally perfect as is.”

Once Cafolla and the group arranged and rehearsed their interpretation of the album, they then performed the set live on Jazz FM and stunned by the reaction, the group decided to record a future live performance at the Glasgow Jazz Festival 2024, for release.

Named after the opening track on Head Hunters, Mama Terra’s Chameleons (Live Interpretations Of Herbie Hancock) sees the group replacing the original synth parts, going back to where Hancock was departing from with the acoustic instruments.

These synth lines and solos are replaced with Rachel Lightbody’s soprano voice, Konrad Wiszniewski’s tenor sax, and the bass sounds with Ross Saunder’s upright bass drenched in FX pedals, with Cafolla remaining on the Rhodes and D6 clavinet with wah pedal.

The album also blends other Hancock tracks ‘Cantaloupe Island’ and ‘Butterfly’ into this mould, taking inspiration from other Hancock albums like Dedication and Flood. The result is an imaginative and contemporary take on the Herbie Hancock album, filtered through Mama Terra’s sound, with absolute love and respect for a masterpiece created by a giant of 20^th century jazz.

Track list: