I set out for the Tyneside Irish Centre at Gallowgate and ended up at the Chilli Arms in Heaton--sounds like the opening lines to a blues song!My intention was to hear Melanie O'Reilly who reportedly sings Celtic Jazz. However, for reasons too complicated to explain, although I got to within sight of its pearly gates, I had a last minute change of mind and so ended up at the Chilli.
This turned out to be a wise (weisser?) move as, unlike last week when frontliners were prominent by their absence, tonight as well as Dave W on trumpet, flugel and vox humana, we also had John Rowland on tenor, Darren Grainger on alto and Laurie Brown on vibes.
They were swinging like a well-oiled gate on "Jumping with Symphony Sid" when I arrived, and "Taking the A Train" when I left. Numbers in between included, a nice "Yardbird Suite", "Blue Skies", "Au Privave" and "Autumn Leaves".
As well as vibing, Laurie also took over the drum chair for a couple of numbers.
The penultimate number, "Moonglow" was perhaps the only let down being dragged out for a little too long; "Moonglow" was no "Picnic".
Apart from that an excellent night.
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