Binker Golding is an award-winning jazz saxophonist, composer, and bandleader based in England. In addition to his own solo recordings and with drummer
Moses Boyd in
Binker & Moses, and played on recordings by many prominent artists on the U.K. jazz scene. He is the musical director of the celebrated Tomorrow’s Warriors Youth Orchestra and has composed concert repertoire for and conducted the Nu Civilization Orchestra.
Golding and
Boyd have recorded several albums as a duo and with guests, including the award-winning
Journey to the Mountain of Forever in 2017 and
Alive in the East the following year.
Golding recorded
Ex Nihilo in duo with pianist
Elliot Galvin, and in 2019, and led the acclaimed quartet offering
Of Reality Past and Incredible Feathers featuring pianist
Joe Armon-Jones. In 2020,
Golding released Escape the Flames, from a 2017 concert with
Boyd, and played on the drummer's award-winning
Dark Matter. In 2021,
Golding teamed with drummer
Steve Noble and double bassist
John Edwards for the full-length
Moon Day. He utilized a quintet including pianist Sarah Tandy for 2022's,
Dream Like a Dogwood Wild Boy.
Golding was born and raised in North London and began playing the saxophone at age eight. He was genuinely fascinated in learning to play classical music but as he got older, he paid more attention to his parents’ record collection, which contained a healthy sampling of artists like
Duke Ellington,
Charlie Parker,
Thelonious Monk, and
Miles Davis. That said, he confessed in an interview that one of the albums that had a profound influence on him was
Guns 'N' Roses Use Your Illusions II. At 15 and still in school,
Golding decided to pursue music as a vocation. He studied jazz at Middlesex and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and became well-versed in the jazz tradition. His tone alternately recalls
Sonny Rollins,
Johnny Hodges, and
Michael Brecker. He has learned from and played alongside prominent saxophonists including
Steve Williamson,
Jason Yarde,
Denys Baptiste, and
Gilad Atzmon. He joined Gary Crosby's Tomorrow’s Warriors, where he met
Boyd. The pair bonded over their spectrum-wide love of jazz and soul. They initially worked together in
McFarlane's live band and played on her 2014 date
If You Knew Her. They formed the
Binker & Moses duo and cut their debut,
Dem Ones, live at
Mark Ronson's Zelig Studio for the Gearbox label in 2015. They won the coveted U.K. MOBO award (Music of Black Origin) as Best Jazz Act. The same year,
Golding joined
Boyd's
Exodus band for the Footsteps of Our Fathers EP.
Two years later,
Binker & Moses cut the double-length
Journey to the Mountain of Forever. Recorded live in two days to quarter-inch analog tape at
Ronson's studio, the finished reels contained five hours of music. While the first disc featured only the duo, on the second they were joined by saxophonist
Evan Parker, trumpeter
Byron Wallen, harpist Tori Handsley, tabla player
Sarathy Korwar, and drummer
Yussef Dayes. The album's release was met with universal acclaim in Europe and the U.S. It was voted the number one Urban Album of the Year by MOJO magazine (beating
Loyle Carner and
Kendrick Lamar.) The same year,
Golding played on a pair of singles by
McFarlane and on jazz singer, pianist, and songwriter
Joy Ellis' debut album
Life on Land.
Binker & Moses issued
Alive in the East for Gearbox in 2018, a concert date that featured the same extended ensemble (sans
Korwar) as the second half of
Journey to the Mountain of Forever.
Golding also worked on Moses Boyd Exodus' sophomore full-length, Displaced Diaspora, that also included
Nubya Garcia on bass clarinet,
Joe Armon-Jones on synthesizer, and
Theon Cross on tuba, among many others.
2019 found
Golding playing live with
Armon-Jones' band,
McFarlane, and producer
Dennis Bovell on the East of the River Nile EP, on jazz pianist Sarah Tandy's debut album Infection in the Sentence, produced by
Ben Lamdin for Jazz Re:freshed, and with
Ashley Henry on her debut
Beautiful Vinyl Hunter.
Golding and pianist
Elliot Galvin issued the duo offering
Ex Nihilo. The saxophonist formed his own quartet with
Armon-Jones on piano, double bassist
Daniel Casimir, and drummer Sam Jones. In September, Gearbox released their debut,
Abstractions of Reality Past and Incredible Feathers, to international acclaim.
Golding teamed with a trio that included drummer
Steve Noble and double bassist
John Edwards for 2021's
Moon Day, released by the Byrd Out label, and the archival live offering Escape the Flames with
Boyd -- whose award-winning
Dark Matter he played on that year. The saxophonist expanded his quartet to a quintet for 2022's
Dream Like a Dogwood Wild Boy. Rising jazz star Sarah Tandy claimed the piano chair from
Armon-Jones, while
Golding added blues and jazz guitarist Billy Adamson. ~ Thom Jurek