Amancio found work doubling as a cleaner and house musician at the famous (or rather notorious…for its gangland regulars) Docklands pub, the Prospect of Whitby (he started as a cleaner). Later work as a guitarist found him playing regularly at the Spanish Garden Club in the West End. By this time their son had recovered to good health. The family lived in South Woodford at first, then Ealing.
It was around this time, somewhere in 1968, soon after the birth of a third child, a daughter, Francesca, that Amancio was introduced to the now legendary producer, Denis Preston.
Denis, who knew immediately that he had found a unique talent, was at that time starting to record albums by cutting edge jazz artists, as well as blues and folk artists, for EMI, at Lansdowne studios in Holland Park. Practically all these recordings are now regarded as engineering masterpieces (credit for which must go to engineer Adrian Kerridge, who worked on most of Amancio’s albums and, is still with the much expanded Lansdowne today, as CEO).
Before long, thanks to Denis’s vision (incidentally the U.S. published Grove Encyclopaedia of Music credits Preston with coining the (soon to be household) term “fusion”), Amancio had been teamed with saxophonist Don Rendell and trumpeter/flugelhorn player Ian Carr, already very well established on the U.K. and European jazz scene with their own quintet, and the superb bassist Dave Green and drummer Trevor Tomkins.
The album that came out of this collaboration was titled simply Integration…introducing Amancio D’Silva, issued on the Columbia label for EMI (Catalogue No. SCX 6322)…now re-released by Universal on CD.
The album is perhaps Amancio’s most straight- Jazz sounding venture, in large part due to the line-up, though the compositions are often infused with elements of his home country’s sounds.
There’s some wonderful playing from everybody here, including an amazingly beautiful solo from Don Rendell on “Jaipur”.
Ian Carr, on the liner notes to Integration, had these words to say of Amancio:
“His melodic flair is Indian but he understands chord sequences (Ed: perhaps an understatement) and he swings like a jazzman…a perpetual inspiration.”
The original cover of Integration, for which the photographer William Holden had Amancio wear a ladies blouse (borrowed from a helpful female assistant, as the story goes) as a neckerchief! But the effect is successful. A classy cover.
Don Locke of Jazz Monthly had this to say of Integration: “Just as Reinhardt was a gypsy playing his special brand of jazz guitar so D’Silva is an Indian playing his special brand of jazz guitar and in each case the music is distinctive and successful to much the same degree for much the same reasons.”
And from john Lewis in Time Out, on the re-issue of Integration:
“...he reinvents jazz as a music forged in Bombay, not New Orleans. A revelation.”
And Dave Gelly in the Observer on the re-issue:
“Of all the attempts to bring together jazz and Indian music, this must be one of the most successful….They strike a perfect balance between the two idioms, and there is none of that phoney 'Eastern' flavouring, featuring sitars and such like, so fashionable at the time. D'Silva plays electric guitar throughout, and the music swings in a completely natural way.”
The “Integration line-up” gigged extensively in London and other cities, being especially well received in Brighton.
“You’ll kick yourself if you miss D’Silva” was the heading of Jeff Rigby’s article in the Brighton and Hove Herald, June 6 th 1969. And, very shortly after the gig he was referring to :“Although many foreign jazz musicians who have visited this country during the past decade have appeared in Brighton’s modern jazz haunts, I cannot recollect any who have received the ovations and acclaim this supreme guitarist from Goa has done.”
Another album was recorded soon after the release of Integration. Hum Dono (Columbia, EMI SCX 6354), which in Hindi means “we two”, was a collaborative work featuring the Joe Harriot Amancio D’Silva Quintet, Denis Preston having introduced Amancio to the Jamaican born, already much recorded and today fairly legendary, saxophonist Joe Harriot; a musician whose playing Amancio greatly admired. As it turned out, this was to be Harriot’s last album. It is the version of
Amancio’s song Jaipur from this album (the album features Amancio’s compositions extensively), that has recently featured on the much acclaimed Impressed with Gilles Peterson, a retro of cutting edge British Jazz from the 60’s, compiled by the Radio1 DJ, and released by Universal (064 7492) in early 2003.
Hum Dono made Melody Maker’s highly recommended list in October ’69 (alongside albums from McCoy Tyner, Don Cherry and Elvin Jones ):
“ the teaming of Harriot’s sarcastic, surging alto and D’Silva’s guitar with its Portuguese and Indian undertones is 100 per cent successful.”
Meanwhile in the U.S., Integration earned Amancio a place in Downbeat magazine’s Critics Poll, placing him – to his astonishment and delight - alongside some of his favourite players such as Jim Hall and Kenny Burrell.
And Melody Maker printed this concerning Amancio’s playing on Hum Dono:
“…the compositions…reflect his preoccupation with effecting an Indian music/Jazz blend. Since Coltrane, this has been a vogue… D’Silva’s grasp of both styles ensures that his blend is far more authentic than a lot of the jazz/raga which is hawked about. His playing too has an individual stamp.”
Later recordings
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BIOGRAPHY - Early recordings
