The Classic Jazz Party: Friday evening jam session @ the Village Hotel, North Tyneside - Nov. 1

As if Friday's two sessions totalling some nine and a half hours weren't enough, Classic Jazz Party attendees made a beeline for the Village Hotel's Pub and Grill, determined to secure ringside seats at the first of the now legendary late night jam sessions. The fleet-of-foot nabbed the best seats, others would make do with a table further from the action. The barflies lined the bar and they weren't going anywhere anytime soon. A pint of Guinness in hand, your correspondent opted to make mental notes, after all, several pints of Guinness later scribbles would look more like hieroglyphics...

Ed Kainyek Quartet w. Rachel Howells @ the Moor Club, Heaton Moor, Stockport - Nov. 3

© Jeff Pritchard

Ed Kainyek (tenor sax); Rachel Howells (vocals); Max Rosen (keys); Gavin Barras (bass); Tim Franks (drums);  Paul Hartley (compere) + Al Scott (keys)*  

This was my fourth visit to the Moor Club's Sunday evening jazz nights and one thing I’ve learned is that if you want to get a good seat then get there early. By 8:30pm the room was filling up nicely with plenty of jazz fans that I recall from the Railway as well as a few newcomers which was great to see. I was pleased to note that, just right of the bar, was a poster of the late great Dexter Gordon - the atmospheric one by Herman Leonard with smoke everywhere. I have the very same picture at home but it is in a heavy frame so it just stands against the wall. Paul said to the audience This is a no smoking room by the way which I thought was amusing.

The Classic Jazz Party: Friday evening @ the Village Hotel, North Tyneside - Nov. 1

Friday evening at the Village Hotel opened with the first of the weekend's three Piano Professor sets featuring Morten Gunnar Larsen. The accomplished, elegant Norwegian pianist entertained an attentive full house. Three further sets would take us up to the 11:00pm finish when all present would adjourn to the Pub and Grill for the first of the Classic Jazz Party's late night jam sessions.

Trumpeter Torstein Kubban led a stirring Livin' High - Clarence Williams Blue Five set. Kubban, of the Norwegian Jazz Kings, has come a long way from his days - or rather nights - sitting in on the high-octane CJP jam sessions. This evening, Kubban led a top notch ensemble, including first timer Natalie Scharf (reeds) from Chicago, Andrew Oliver (piano) from Portland, Oregon and, from France, the wonderful Félix Hunot (banjo) and the equally wonderful singer Nicolle Rochelle.

Preview: The Gil Scott-Heron Songbook is coming to Gosforth Civic Theatre (Thursday Nov. 7)!!!

At Gosforth Civic Theatre tomorrow (Thurs. 7) it's the last date of the Aki Remally-Fraser Urquhart tour celebrating the music of Gil Scott-Heron.

 Fixtures on the Scottish jazz scene, Remally (guitar, vocals) and Urquhart (piano) have been touring their Gil Scott-Heron project as a quartet with the ace rhythm section of bassist Tom Wilkinson and drummer Max Popp. Their focus is on the life and music of poet, composer, jazz musician and pioneering rapper, Gil Scott-Heron. 

Some of us were at Riverside circa 1990 when the legendary American appeared at the 'old place' on Melbourne Street. For those of us who weren't, Thursday evening at Gosforth Civic Theatre is the closest we'll get to experiencing the life and times of Gil Scott-Heron. Book now at: www.gosforthcivictheatre.co.uk. Russell     

Guy Davis @ the Witham, Barnard Castle, - Nov. 2

I've often said there's no such thing as a crap gig by a black American blues artist and this was no exception, however...

In West Yorkshire in a previous life I would regularly cross the border to Colne and Burnley for their annual blues festivals and - time and time again - there'd be a buzz around the latest bar-room rocker and his guitar skills, only to have any recollection of them obliterated within seconds of the headline act taking to the stage. 

Guy Davis is one of those journeyman bluesmen who straddles country blues from the beginning of the last century through to Chicago's electric blues of the fifties. This meant he could turn up with a small band or a selection of string instruments and accessories. I'd have preferred a band of course, but the latter was fine also: two acoustic guitars (a six string and a twelve string), plus a harmonica and some heavy foot-tapping providing rhythm. And crucially no banjo, which features prolifically - though tastefully - on most of his albums.

Album review: Bill Frisell, Kit Downes, Andrew Cyrille - Breaking The Shell (Red Hook Records)

Bill Frisell (electric guitar); Kit Downes (organ); Andrew Cyrille (drums); Lucy Railton (cello on El)

What do you expect from an instrumental line up like that? Guitar, organ drums – a classic organ trio. Surely, a bit of the old funked-up electric boogaloo is in store? Not this time kids. This is less predictable, more stripped back, though not laid-back. It’s intense, angular and unlike recent works by Frisell and Downes. For a start, the organ isn’t electric; the album was recorded using the Church organ at St. Luke in The Fields in Greenwich Village, New York.

It opens with an ominous low drone and some delicate tracery of notes on the organ, little more than aural scratches; the drone fades and Frisell steps into the gap whilst Cyrille skirts around the proceedings, adding some propulsive skitterings. Second track, Untitled 23, is all angles from Frisell, ably supported by rolls and crashes and more skittering from the drummer. Frisell’s voice on the guitar rises and stops with a melancholy fall, he questions and probes and Cyrille fills in the colours in between.

Sinatra @ Capitol: Part one

Frank Sinatra was, indisputably, the greatest ever purveyor of the Great American Songbook. From his early days with the bands of Harry James and Tommy Dorsey through to his latter years when, although the voice had lost some of the magic it once had, he could still get to the essence of a lyric. More so even than Ella who, via the series of songbooks she recorded for Norman Granz, never quite matched Sinatra on the emotional level.

However, from all of his many albums, none of them quite reached the standard of those he recorded for Capitol during the 1950s. This was the period when, in popular music terms, he wrote Shakespeare's sonnets, painted the Mona Lisa, composed Beethoven's Fifth and kayoed Rocky Marciano.

In the above collage I've highlighted  the first six of twelve of my favourites. The other six will follow in a second post.

Afternoon Jazz @ Saisons, Burton Road Didsbury: Richard Iles Trio - Nov. 3

© Phil Portus

Richard Iles (flugel); Richard Jones (piano); Joshua Cavanagh-Brierley (bass).

After such a great gig by Greg Abate and his amazing musicians at Cheltenham's  Victory Club on Friday, I was not expecting much from this, my first visit to the Saisons, but I was surprised at how much I enjoyed the music. 

The venue is small and has seating outside which was already occupied when I  arrived by taxi just in time for the 3pm start. There are no buses running at all in Handforth on Sundays and you are lucky if any of the trains are not cancelled. 

Saisons is in West Didsbury and is very close to where the Midland Hotel was once situated and was the scene of many legendary jazz encounters. I think the pub is still there but has a new name. The famous Alan Hare Big Band used to play every week and that band was known world wide. Yep, Didsbury was buzzing back then!           

Press release: Pete Allen Jazz Band -Touring dates (down south) November 2024

During a professional career in show business that has spanned over 46 years, there is so much Pete has achieved that it is impossible to list everything. During the past 46 years, his band personnel has always featured a host of British talent, and his present line-up is no exception:  Pete Allen on clarinet and saxes,  Roger Marks (trombone), Chris Hodgkins (trumpet) - who has rejoined the band after 41 years - Jim Newton (drums), Dave Hanratty (bass), James Clemas (piano) plus Trevor Whiting (clarinet and saxes) and Max Brittain (banjo and guitar) on the 21st and 27th November.

Press release: Orchestras celebrate Duke royally across Scotland

© Shawn Pearce

Comprising thirty-four musicians, Remembering Duke will feature an opening set by the seventeen-strong Tommy Smith Youth Jazz Orchestra. The SNJO will then play its internationally acclaimed Ellington interpretations with their special guest, singer Lucy-Anne Daniels adding gospel music-inspired selections of the great composer’s songs.

“Duke Ellington has been an inspiration to musicians and composers across the musical spectrum for almost 100 years,” says SNJO founder and musical director, saxophonist Tommy Smith. “The breadth of his writing encompasses songs that were the pop music of the day and hugely descriptive suites that compare with works in the classical canon in terms of ambition. It’s wonderful to witness young players from the TikTok era finding their way into playing jazz through Ellington as generations before have done.”