Adrian Dunbar presents The Waste Land: Live at the Queen Elizabeth Hall

The idea of setting T.S. Eliot’s ‘The Waste Land’ came from UK celebrated actor and director Adrian Dunbar. Presented as part of this year’s EFG London Jazz Festival at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, the resulting music for four voices, jazz quintet, orchestra and film was composed by Nick Roth.

It was a stunning recitation of a wonderful poem: The Waste Land is a significant 20th century poem that takes myth and story-telling into the realms of fantasy, generally regarded as one of T.S. Eliot’s finest works. Alongside a world-class jazz quintet and orchestra, the four voices were perfect - all brought together on stage by conductor John Harle.

Snippets of period film footage accompanied the music and speech to complete the performance trio.

Directed and introduced by Adrian Dunbar and staged by his production company Unreal Cities, the piece was commissioned by the Happy Days Enniskillen International Beckett Festival 2015 with the permission of the T. S. Eliot Estate, becoming the only performance of the poem in its 100-year history to include musical accompaniment.

Nick Roth’s music was performed alongside film by four actors, jazz quintet and a full orchestra in collaboration with the Guildhall Session Orchestra, conducted by John Harle. It is no surprise that Dunbar should maintain his close relationship with his alma mater, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

The four voices were: Anna Nygh; Orla Charlton; Frank McCusker; and Stanley Townsend. The jazz quintet was Alex Bonney (trumpet and electronics); Nick Roth (saxes and objects); Alexander Hawkins (piano), Oli Hayhurst (bass) and Simon Roth (drums). Nick Roth's sax playing was brilliant, and his use of objects to create sound effects was inspired. Running water, falling leaves and crunching gravel added to the effects of voices, music and film.

This performance of The Waste Land was extraordinary and thought-provoking. The world of Eliot’s writing context seems to have changed little in a century amid the threats of conflict around the world. Dunbar and Roth have created something that the poet would probably approve of, expanding the spread of his brilliant and evocative words.