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Bebop Spoken There

Art Blakey: "You [Bobby Watson] don't want to play too long, because you don't know they're clapping because they're glad you finished!" - (JazzTimes, Nov. 2019)..

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!"

Postage

15848 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 15 years ago. 855 of them this year alone and, so far, 53 this month (Sept. 18).

From This Moment On ...

September

Thu 21: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 21: La Malbec Orchestra @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.
Thu 21: Merlin Roxby @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Ragtime piano. A 'Jar on the Bar' gig.
Thu 21: Linsday Hannon: Tom Waits for No Man @ Harbour View, Sunderland. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 21: Ray Stubbs R & B All Stars @ The Schooner, Gateshead. 8:30pm. Free.
Thu 21: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman's Club, Middlesbrough. 9:00pm.

Fri 22: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Fri 22: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 22: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms, Monkseaton. 1:00pm.
Fri 22: Brief Encounter @ Bardon Mill Village Hall, Northumberland. 7:00pm. Tickets: £10.00. adv from 07885 303166; £12.00. on the door. Chris & Veronica Perrin improvising to a screening of the 1929 'Jazz Age' silent film Piccadilly (Dir. Ewald André Dupont).
Fri 22: Paul Edis & Graeme Wilson + Three Tsuru Origami @ Jesmond United Reformed Church, Newcastle. 7:30pm. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Fri 22: Crooners @ Tyne Theatre, Newcastle. 7:30pm.
Fri 22: Abbie Finn's Finntet @ Traveller's Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. Opus 4 Jazz Club.

Sat 23: Tyne Valley Big Band @ Tanfield Railway, Gateshead. 2:00-4:00pm. Free. A '1940s Weekend' event.
Sat 23: Jason Isaacs @ Stack, Seaburn. 3:30-5:30pm. Free.
Sat 23: Andrew Porritt & Keith Barrett @ Cullercoats Watch House, Front St., Cullercoats NE30 4QB. 7:00pm.
Sat 23: Michael Woods @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free. A 'Jar on the Bar' gig. Country blues.

Sun 24: Musicians Unlimited @ Park Inn, Hartlepool. 1:00pm. Free.
Sun 24: More Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free.

Mon 25: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Mon 25: Michael Young Trio @ The Engine Room, Sunderland. 7:00pm.

Tue 26: Paul Skerritt @ The Rabbit Hole, Hallgarth St., Durham DH1 3AT. 7:00pm. Paul Skerritt's (solo) weekly residency.

Wed 27: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Wed 27: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 27: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm.

Thursday, May 31, 2012

Book review: The Baroness by Hannah Rothschild.


(Review by Lance.)
Suddenly she's everywhere in my life. A BBC documentary (The Jazz Baroness), a DVD of the same plus, a biography by David Kaskin - Nica's Dream - and now this! The Baroness by Pannonica Rothschild's great niece Hannah.
I devoured the pages - how could I not? I think I fell in love with the Baroness when I first read about Charlie Parker dying in her apartment  whilst watching the Dorsey Brothers' Show on television!
To an impressionable 15 year old whose parents had yet to acquire a television set the idea of a jazz musician dying in the New York apartment of a beautiful Baroness whilst watching other jazz musicians on tv seemed to me to be the ideal way to go! Of course if I'd realised at the time the tragi-drug related circumstances described in the book I may have removed the rose tinted glasses.
At least 24 compositions have been dedicated to the mysterious Baroness, including one by Britain's Eddie Thompson. - I wonder if anyone other than Duke can boast more?
This is a book to stay up night's for because, unlike other treatise's on the subject, this one concentrates on Hannah's quest to find out more about her great aunt Pannonica Rothschild rather than Monk, Bird and co although they are not short changed by any means.
The first half of the book delves into the Rothschild dynasty and what an odd bunch they were. Hannah's brother Victor studied jazz piano with Teddy Wilson and, during the Second World War worked for MI(5/6) on bomb disposal. He claimed that years of copying Teddy Wilson and Art Tatum's chords was ideal preparation for such a tricky task. He was awarded the George Medal - presumably for his bomb disposal rather than deciphering Art Tatum chords although that too is most surely worth a gong of some sort!
Nica also had quite a war fighting with the Free French Army in North Africa and rumoured to have flown Lancaster Bombers....
The second half centres around Monk, the drug bust she took for him, her tending him both in sickness and in health, his idiosyncrasies and much, much much more.
They were enigmatic people and despite the reams that have been written about the true relationship between Nica, Monk and his wife Nellie, it remains Mysterioso.
Nevertheless, although there isn't a lot of new jazz material in The Baroness, I found it compelling reading. Should you have Pannonica playing as you read - the live version recorded at The Five Spot - it will do nothing to spoil your pleasure. Pleasure perhaps isn't the right word as there is a lot of pain and suffering re-counted but, whatever, it is a fascinating study of pre-war European opulence, wartime, bebop and black America in the 1950s and '60s.
Nica, if there's a bar at that jazz club in the sky and the guys are blowing, - put down an extra teacup at the table and pour me a demi-tasse of Scotch.
Lance.
Hannah Rothschild: The Baroness. Virago Press. ISBN 978-184408-603-0.

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