Paris June 2015
(Review/Photos by Peter Ninnim)
(Review/Photos by Peter Ninnim)
By
chance my good lady had booked us a five day Paris break coinciding with the
first part of this two week event and what with that and all the normal Jazz
clubs it was wall to wall jazz!
Diary.
Day one.
Jazz
club Chez Papa just down the street from the hotel in the Rue St-Benoit. Pianist Remi Toulon and Bass player
Jean-Luc Arramy Drummer not available and unfortunately no Kit lying
about. These two were a revelation; lots
of original stuff and very melodic. It must have been good, I bought a CD! The
food in the club was first class (and as in all Paris very reasonable in price)
and as there was no admission fee it was an excellent evening and we left after
midnight.
Day two.
Lots
of Jazz on the street, largely New Orleans based.
Day Three.
Shai
Maestro trio as above. What a band. Based in New York but travelling the world.
Keep an eye out for the band if they appear in the UK. The bass player, Jorge
Roeder was exceptional but the drummer Ziv Ravitz was in a class of his own.
The concert scheduled for two hours over ran by about 45 minutes. Three
standing ovations and the stand selling CDs at the end impossible to reach. The
drummer in particular was a big favourite with the audience and he was a bit
show-biz but he was entitled to be so.
After
about thirty minutes I really started to appreciate the music; it wasn’t that
there was lots of technical difficulty as far as I could see but the way it all
went together just worked completely. There are a few good extracts on youtube
which might give a taste of the trio.
Anyway
out of the theatre at 11.45 and round the corner to a bar that we had spotted
which turned out to be a club famous in the area and called “Le petit Journal”.
Here in a cellar down two flights of stairs we found wonderful soprano sax
player Marc Laferrierre and his band playing understated New Orleans Jazz until
one o’clock. They unusually spoke very little English and I am unsure of the
names as there was a quite a lot of sitting-in. I think that the trumpet was
Boss Queraud.
Excellent
band; we were not asked for admission (as it was so late) but the beer was 15
Euros a pint! The sort of club everyone wishes to stumble across!
Day 4
Came
across a trio playing soft jazz in the café Beaux Arts, on the Left Bank near
Notre Dame, but could not stay long; other non-music events called.
Day
5
Free
street concert; first “Utopia Quartet” and then “Agathe Jazz Quartet.” Both these groups were vocalist led and were
warmly appreciated by a very large audience outside the “Deux Magots” café on
the Boulvard Saint Germaine.
A
great week; and sorry to leave before all the other jazz on the programme. I’ll
try again next year. With more time there were plenty of late night Jam
sessions available of a very high standard.
Photos.
Photos.
Peter
N.
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