Despite its modest role on the world stage, Belgium has produced a number of internationally renowned musicians and composers. There is the iconic gypsy jazz guitar maestro Django Reinhardt, whose position remains unassailable, and guitarist/harmonica player Toots Thielemans, who became an internationally renowned artist performing and recording with Bill Evans, Oscar Peterson, Ella Fitzgerald, Peggy Lee, Shirley Horn and Quincy Jones. The other key Belgian figure is composer/arranger Francy Boland, co-leader with US bebop drumming legend Kenny Clarke of Europe’s leading big band of the 60s, the Clarke-Boland Big Band.

Whereas the post-war modern jazz scene produced a few notable successes, trad and New Orleans style jazz remained popular and bebop and swing were still played during the peak post-bop and free jazz years of the late-60s and early-70s. Despite the overwhelming popularity of ‘historic’ forms, there were a few worthy exceptions who pointed the way to the future: composer and pianist Marc Moulin formed his first trio in 1961 as a backing band for expatriate American musicians such as Johnny Griffin and Don Byas. He later collaborated with Philip Catherine to form Placebo, a group that mixed jazz, funk, rock, and electronic sounds. Their influences ranged from Jimi Hendrix to James Brown, via Herbie Hancock and Soft Machine, and they experimented with the Moog and early synthesizers. Between 1971 and 1975 Placebo released three albums that have become much sought after by DJs and producers for beats and grooves to sample. Moulin also contributed sleeve notes to one of the most sought after European deep jazz re- cordings of the late 1960s and early 1970s, and it’s a Belgian recording no less:‘Babs Robert and the Love Planet’ (Alpha 7003, 1970) is one of the few examples of Belgium avant-garde jazz and was originally released on the Alpha label, a tiny enterprise based in Jette, Belgium. Alpha released renais- sance / baroque music and the Babs Robert album is a wonderful aberration that is such an outlier as to be seemingly from another planet – the very Love Planet name-checked in the title perhaps?

Robert’s path to music gained pace in 1948 when he moved to Brussels, taking courses in music theory and harmony at the Etterbeek Academy under the direction of the composer Jean Absil. “In the two years at the Etterbeek Academy”, said Robert, “I was directed by the composer Jean Absil, where I studied music and music theory. These will all be the extent of my formal studies, the rest I will learn empirically. I have mostly been influenced suc- cessively by Stan Getz, Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, and Lee Konitz”

After a meeting with the pianist Johnny Brouwers, Robert was encouraged to perform in amateur orchestras and, for several months, he was part of Tempo’s Cool Boys, a band jointly directed by Johnny Brouwers and guitarist Roland Gohy. Whilst playing in Temp’s Cool Boys, Robert also performed in various clubs in Brussels, most notably at the Black Rose, where he played with visiting American musicians such as Andrew McGhee, Jeremy Steig, Eric Dixon, Zoot Sims, and Jerry Coker.

In 1957, Robert met Johnny Brouwers in The Jazz Preachers, who was to prove a crucial partner, and went on to win the prize for best saxophonist at the National Tournament of the Hot Club of Belgium. In January 1960, together with Brouwers, Robert formed his own quartet with Brouwers on piano, Paul Dubois on double bass, and Robert Pernet on drums. This group is considered by some to among the first Belgian band to perform cutting edge modern jazz and they toured extensively for the next ten years, playing shows and festivals across Europe including Comblain-la- Tour (1960, 1961 and 1969), Geneva (1962), and Montreux (1967). It was at Montreux that Robert was awarded the Prix de la Ville.

The mid to late 60s saw the band tour across Holland, Germany, and Switzerland, often at the instigation of the Belgian Ministry of Culture.
In 1968, the Quartet was invited to perform in Poland, at the famous
Jazz Jamboree in Warsaw. Their performance was welcomed by both a fervent and knowledgeable audience as well as the Muza Records, the leading state label, who recorded the performance. The track ‘Architextu- re’ was included on the album ‘Jazz Jamboree 68’ alongside the Lu- dwikowsky Big Band of The Moscow Radio and TV and a trad jazz band, Old Timers.

In September of 1968, Robert recorded with the Brussels Art Quintet, releasing the modal jazz EP ‘Voir / Four Paul S.’, written by guitarist Da- niel Schellekens, on BAQ Records. The following year saw the creation of The Love Planet ensemble, a project that was to extensively develop and multiply rhythmic combinations within an extended orchestral form by adding a second double bass player, Michel Gobbe, and vibraphonist / percussionist, Johnny Peret.

The Love Planet performed in the main clubs of Brussels, such as Blue Note, Pol’s Jazz Place, and Smog as well as in major musical events throughout Belgium including to big festivals in 1969 – the Avant-Garde Festival in Ghent and the First International Jazz Event in Liege – where the Love Planet shared the bill with Miles Davis – and the Bilzen Jazz Festival in 1970. The contrast between the musical architecture of the themes and sonic freedom in the improvised playing perfectly illustrated the polymorphism – an order within disorder – which the Love Planet aimed for.

The initial original quartet line-up was Babs Robert (sax), Paul Dubois (bass), Johnny Brouwers (piano), and Johnny Peret / Robert Pernet (dru- ms). On the album session, the quartet was augmented with the addition of John Van Rjimenant (saxes) and Michel Gobbe (bass). As well as their main instruments, the band members also played an array of unusual instruments, principally percussion. This is the first official re-release
of the ‘Babs Robert and the Love Planet’. Original copies of the album fetch many hundreds of Euros on the collecting circuit and it remains a curious and fascinating window into a moment in time that still resona- tes some fifty years later. Come with us to the Love Planet.