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Bebop Spoken There

Spasmo Brown: “Jazz is an ice cream sandwich! It's the Fourth of July! It's a girl with a waterbed!”. (Syncopated Times, July, 2024).

The Things They Say!

Hudson Music: Lance's "Bebop Spoken Here" is one of the heaviest and most influential jazz blogs in the UK.

Rupert Burley (Dynamic Agency): "BSH just goes from strength to strength".

'606' Club: "A toast to Lance Liddle of the terrific jazz blog 'Bebop Spoken Here'"

The Strictly Smokin' Big Band included Be Bop Spoken Here (sic) in their 5 Favourite Jazz Blogs.

Ann Braithwaite (Braithwaite & Katz Communications) You’re the BEST!

Holly Cooper, Mouthpiece Music: "Lance writes pull quotes like no one else!"

Simon Spillett: A lovely review from the dean of jazz bloggers, Lance Liddle...

Josh Weir: I love the writing on bebop spoken here... I think the work you are doing is amazing.

Postage

17444 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 718 of them this year alone and, so far, 100 this month (Oct. 10).

From This Moment On ...

October

Sat 12: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 12: Michael Woods @ Victoria Tunnel, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £12.00. (£10.00. adv.). Country blues guitar & vocals.
Sat 12: Nauta @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £13.28, £11.16, £9.04. A two-track recording launch gig.
Sat 12: Stuart Turner @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Rockabilly, rhythm & blues etc. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sat 12: Lapwing Jazz Trio @ The Ship Inn, Low Newton. 8:00pm. Free. New trio: Paula Whitty, Richard Herdman, Jude Murphy.

Sun 13: Am Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free.
Sun 13: Emma Wilson @ Tyne Bar, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. Blues.
Sun 13: Catfish Keith @ The Cluny. 7:00pm. Country blues.
Sun 13: Cath Stephens & Paul Grainger @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Stephens & Grainger, one third of a triple bill.
Sun 13: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.

Mon 14: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 14: Black is the Color of My Voice @ Hippodrome, Darlington. 7:30pm. Apphia Campbell’s one-woman show inspired by Nina Simone, performed by Nicholle Cherrie.

Tue 15: Jam session @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free. House trio: Alan Law (piano), Paul Grainger (double bass), Bailey Rudd (drums).

Wed 16: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 16: Cath Stephens’ improvisation workshop @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 4:30-6:00pm. Collaborative group focusing on vocal improvisations.
Wed 16: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 16: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.

Thu 17: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 17: Olivia Cuttill Quintet @ King’s Hall, Newcastle University. 1:15pm. Free.
Thu 17: Moonlight Serenade Orchestra UK: Glenn Miller & Big Band Spectacular @ Phoenix Theatre, Blyth. 7:30pm.
Thu 17: Merlin Roxby @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free. Ragtime piano. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Thu 17: Niffi Osiyemi Trio @ The Harbour View, Sunderland. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 17: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman’s Club, Middlesborough. Guests Jeremy McMurray (keys); Richie Emmerson (tenor sax); Mark Toomey (alto sax); Adrian Beadnell (bass). 8:30pm. Free.

Fri 18: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 18: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 18: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 18: Hot Club du Nord @ St Cuthbert’s, Crook. 7:30pm.
Fri 18: Chet Set @ Seventeen Nineteen, Hendon, Sunderland. 7:30pm. Pete Tanton & co.
Fri 18: Michael Woods @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. Doors 7:30pm (upstairs). A Hoodoo Blues dance & social event. £10.00. class & social (£10.00., £7.50., £5.00. social only). Michael Woods (country blues guitar) on stage 9:00pm.
Fri 18: East Coast Swing Band @ Hexham Abbey. 7:30pm. £9.00.
Fri 18: Ben Crosland Quartet @ Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. Opus 4 Jazz Club.
Fri 18: Durham University Jazz Society’s ‘High Standards’ @ Music Dept. Music Room, Divinity House, Palace Green, Durham University DH1 3RS. 8:009:30pm. Tel: 0191 334 1419. £7.00., £5.00.
Fri 18: Ray Stubbs R&B All Stars @ Blues Underground, Nelson St., Newcastle. 9:00pm. Free.

Reviewers wanted

Whilst BSH attempts to cover as many gigs, festivals and albums as possible, to make the site even more comprehensive we need more 'boots on the ground' to cover the albums seeking review - a large percentage of which never get heard - report on gigs or just to air your views on anything jazz related. Interested? then please get in touch. Contact details are on the blog. Look forward to hearing from you. Lance

Friday, March 20, 2009

Nigel Stanger Update by Germaine

Dear Lance, We are so grateful that you remembered Nigel on the tenth anniversary of his death. His daughters, son in law, grandchildren and I, spent the 15th of March in Beadnell where his ashes are buried. It was the place he spent his teenage summers. I doubt Nigel played alto behind the WI hut, although I remember him talking of doing other things there and of singing "For those in peril on the sea', whenever his father tempted him out in his sailing dingy.
Nigel said they were only ever fifteen feet from shore and people, attracted by the volume of his singing, would wade in to rescue him. Nigel got his own back when he and his father played, (with undisguised rivalry,) 'The Entrance of the Queen of Sheba' on a couple of grand pianos. They fitted together like jig saw pieces.
I met Nigel's father when I was singing with the Johnny Taws trio, at the Gosforth Park Hotel. He told me of his pianos and that his son played jazz. I was, and indeed am, generally unimpressed by the number of pianos people own, or indeed, offspring claiming to be jazz musicians, however I became interested when, shortly afterwards, I heard Nigel play. He was with his quartet at a Newcastle Big Band gig in Eldon Square, at which I too was performing. I thought Nigel was showing off. Later I knew that it wasn't 'showing off,' merely brilliant musicianship. There was no distance between player and instrument, they were one. Later I understood the extent of Nigel's creativity, which encompassed playing, in addition to alto and tenor saxophones, piano and Hammond organ. He also had great skill as a writer and an architect. He had degrees in both English and architecture.
To his family and friends however, it is possibly his humour that is remembered on an everyday basis, he was a very witty man. His command of English, coupled with physical expressions, generated so much laughter we were helpless for much of the time. This humour was what drew Nigel and Chas Chandler together, years after they played in the 'Animals’. The outcome of that friendship (and copious giggling,) was the Newcastle Arena. Sitting in the Collingwood Arms, Jesmond, designing the future on the back of an envelope, during a game of chess.
Alex, Jessica, Ben and I were still laughing when Nigel was very ill in hospital, saying things like the WC Field's classic, "On the whole I'd rather be in Philadelphia," or as Madeline Chandler reminded me this morning, "I married a torch singer who turned into a fell walker,when I wasn't looking.'
His humour helped to hide the hideous brutality of a cancer that killed him at the early age of 56. So, when we all gathered around his grave, in the sunshine, last Sunday, it was with great sadness, with love and with laughter. We apologized to him for being unable to bury a vast quantity of booze in his grave, for going for a slap up lunch without him, and for playing in the sand with the granddaughters he never met. They call him Grandpa Nigel. I can almost hear him say "I can't be called Grandpa. I'm a mere boy and my name, to them and everyone else, is N I G E L, or on second thoughts, WJN Stanger sounds OK. I used to play the saxophone you know. Unfortunately, there's very little call for it here. It would help if John Pearce, Alfie Parker, Ronnie Pearson, Pat Crumly, Alexis Korner, Lyndolph D'Oliveira and Malcolm Saul could drop in." Is this Ok Lance? I was so very glad you remembered. We think the photograph of Nigel clapping is terrific and we haven't got a copy???
All best. Germaine.

1 comment :

Anonymous said...

Wot no bass player? Or is he keeping the gig open for Sting?

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