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He composed the largest known work for the Edinburgh Youth Orchestra's 40th anniversary. Written for saxophone, bass and drums plus a one hundred-strong symphony orchestra and entitled Edinburgh, this was premiered on April 12, 2003 in the Usher Hall, Edinburgh before touring Latvia, Estonia, Russia and Finland.

In 2005, Smith reunited with Joe Locke, touring with the vibist's group, and formed a duo with another long-time colleague, Norwegian bassist Arild Andersen, which continues to tour as their respective schedules permit.

Most recently, Smith created an expanded jazz arrangement of George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue for the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra with pianist Brian Kellock as the featured soloist. This was premiered to huge acclaim as the opening concert of Edinburgh Jazz Festival on Friday July 28, 2006.

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Scottish National Jazz Orchestra

In a busy schedule of touring, writing and recording, Smith found the time and energy to launch the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra in 1995, and remains its director. SNJO has presented programmes of both repertory classics and more contemporary works, often specially commissioned.

The repertory programmes have included Duke Ellington's extended suites, celebrations of Count Basie and Benny Goodman (with special guest Ken Peplowski) and the collaborations between Miles Davis and Gil Evans - Porgy & Bess, Sketches of Spain (both with Gerard Presencer as trumpet soloist) and Miles Ahead (with Ingrid Jensen). SNJO has also presented the music of Charles Mingus, Oliver Nelson, Benny Carter, Kenton, Monk and Pat Metheny (with guitarists Jim Mullen, Phil Robson, Mike Walker and Kevin MacKenzie) and premiered special commissions by Keith Tippett, Florian Ross, and Geoffrey Keezer as well as specially commissioned arrangements of Chick Corea compositions.

In addition, SNJO has performed music by contemporary jazz creators. These include Kenny Wheeler's Sweet Sister Suite; Joe Lovano's Celebrating Sinatra, with arrangements by the late Manny Albam; a programme of the music of Maria Schneider, conducted by the composer; and Smith's own Planet Wave, an adventurous large-scale composition made possible by the Arts Foundation/Barclays Bank jazz composition fellowship prize which marries Smith's music to poet Edwin Morgan's text to great effect. The concerts with Joe Lovano also featured the premiere of Smith's acclaimed Torah, a work based on the first five books of the Bible, in which a titanic struggle between good and evil is vividly enacted. Written over seventy days, the fifty-minute composition was created specially for the phenomenal American tenor saxophonist and SNJO. The same evening Torah was being premiered in Scotland, Dame Cleo Laine and John Dankworth premiered another work by Smith and Edwin Morgan, The Morning of the Imminent, at The Kennedy Center in Washington, DC.

SNJO has also provided a platform for jazz musicians and composers based in Scotland to write for big band in concerts devoted to suites comprising contributions by orchestra members and external contributors alike. These include The Solar Suite, Great Scots Suite and The Edinburgh Suite.

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The Future

Tommy Smith remains full of creative ideas. It is clear that he is going to continue creating music of lasting value. His journey across two decades packed with original and inspiring music has demonstrated conclusively that his is a singular musical voice, and one which has much still to say.

His tireless work in jazz education, which has included conceiving the curriculum for the short-lived Scottish Jazz Conservatory, campaigning for a jazz presence in Scottish further education and teaching individual students, continues unabated and his ambitions for jazz to be given the same status in Scottish education as it enjoys elsewhere continue to take up much time and energy that could be devoted to personal music projects.

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