Jools Street

I just wanted to say a MASSIVE ‘Thank You’ you were amazing. We had so many positive comments about you. Really sorry we didn’t get to talk. Them two hours of arriving at the venue were crazy. Everyone wanted photos. I was listening though and you sounded amazing. Thank you for doing the wedding at short notice, we couldn’t of asked for a better violinist. Thank you for the bottom of our hearts

Jools composed and remotely recorded violin sections for 3 of my tracks: Just For a Day; Roman 7; Boneyard. The tracks have an American influence but would fall under the indie genre. Essentially, the remit for Jools was to 'bulk them out' with strings. Although I had not actually met Jools in person (and still haven't), he was extremely responsive when communicating via email and therefore didn't need to meet. Before agreeing, he encouraged me to listen to his back catalogue - I was impressed with the breadth and depth of genres that Jools had worked with and I was pleased to learn he had worked with a couple of acquaintances of mine- namely The Birmingham Philharmonic Orchestra and Chris Tye. Listening to his work, I was impressed by his knack around texturising songs- in my experience, strings can sometimes feel isolated from the rest of the instrumentation and I am aware that some string players find this aspect of composition challenging. Throughout the process, Jools ensured he had a secure understanding around my expectations. This brought about discussion around dynamics, chord progression technique (tremolo, tied sections etc). Although he was happy to read from transcript, I felt that his take on composition would be much better than mine, so he kindly agreed to compose the parts himself. After recording the first version, he sent me recordings via YouTube- he even went to the trouble of including a running text commentary of his thoughts within the video itself. This meant that I could give better feedback and bounce off his ideas. I was especially amazed by the turnaround (3 days to complete the process) as I had not set any deadlines or ball-park timeframes. Jools' playing is technically perfect and he has an exceptional ear for harmony and dynamics. e.g. He knew not to play for the sake of playing, and when to build to crescendo. He was able to add a range of chords, hooks and new melodies to the song. In Boneyard, the melody in the instrumental chorus ended up becoming the dominant hook- this was totally unplanned. Much like his violin playing, the overall recording quality was very professional. If you are looking for an outstanding string player who is both technical and visionary, Jools would be my number one recommendation.