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Bebop Spoken There

Kurt Elling: ''There's something to learn from every musician you play with''. (DownBeat, December 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

17630 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 904 of them this year alone and, so far, 49 this month (Dec. 20).

From This Moment On ...

December

Mon 23: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Wheatsheaf, Benton Sq., Whitley Road, Palmersville NE12 9SU. Tel: 0191 266 8137. 1:00pm. Free. CANCELLED!
Mon 23: Edison Herbert Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 4:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 4:00-6:00pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Mon 23: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.

Tue 24: Lindsay Hannon & Mark Williams @ Ernest, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 11:00am-1:00pm. Free.
Tue 24: Paul Skerritt @ Mambo Wine & Dine, South Shields. 1:00pm. Free. Vocalist Skerritt working with backing tapes.

Wed 25: Wot? No jazz!

Thu 26: The Boneshakers @ Tyne Bar, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. The 17th annual Boneshakers’ Shindig.

Fri 27: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 27: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free. Business as usual!.
Fri 27: Jason Isaacs @ Seaburn STACK, Seaburn. 3:30-5:30pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Fri 27: Michael Woods @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Country blues guitar & vocals.

Sat 28: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 11:30am. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Sat 28: Fri 20: Castillo Nuevo @ Revoluçion de Cuba, Newcastle. 5:30pm. Free.
Sat 28: Jude Murphy, Rich Herdman & Giles Strong @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sat 28: Ray Stubbs R & B All-Stars @ Billy Bootlegger’s, Stepney Bank, Newcastle. 9:00pm. Free.

Sun 29: Paul Skerritt @ Hibou Blanc, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free. Vocalist Skerritt working with backing tapes.
Sun 29: Alexia Gardner Quintet @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.

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

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Book Review: Nica's Dream - The Life and Legend of the Jazz Baroness by David Kastin.

Brought up in fairy-tale splendour, Kathleen Annie Pannonica Rothschild de Koenigswarter (known as "Nica") piloted her own plane across the English Channel, married a French baron, fought in the Resistance and had five children - but then she heard a recording of Thelonious Monk's "'Round Midnight". Beguiled by the beauty and liberating spirit of jazz, she moved to Manhattan, where she began hosting jam sessions, socialising with Beat poets and driving her silver Rolls Royce to the Five Spot and other fabled jazz venues. The tabloids first splashed her name across the headlines after Charlie Parker died in her hotel suite but through her ministrations to Monk and other musicians she became a legend. Based on interviews with musicians, family members, historians and artists, this, the first biography of Nica, unwraps this enigmatic figure and evokes New York during the birth of bebop and the advent of abstract expressionism.
The above is from the publisher's blurb but the book itself is so so much more than the biography of one of jazz's more enigmatic fringe figures. 
Because of her association with Bird, Monk and the many other bebop musicians she came in contact with this is as much their story as it is hers. With each page you are on 52nd St., or listening to Monk at the Five Spot Café, driving with him through Delaware where a couple of cops beat him up or digging the jams in her various hotel rooms (she usually got evicted!)
Nica literally poured her soul and her money into helping and supporting modern jazz musicians and Monk in particular. Often pilloried and misunderstood by the media her enthusiasm never wavered - a truly remarkable woman.
And this is a remarkable book of the I couldn't put it down variety.
Author David Kaston, a music historian and educator living in Brooklyn is the author of I Hear America Singing. His work has appeared in Down Beat, The Village Voice and Da Capa Best Music Writing series.
Lance.
David Kastin: Nica's Dream - The Life and Legend of the Jazz Baroness. Published by W.W.Norton & Company. ISBN 978-0-393-06940-2. 

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