Clervaux Artisan Bakery’s covered courtyard on Coniscliffe Road is the perfect place for an early start the morning after the night before. Jazz from 10:00am with a coffee, pastry or something more substantial kick-started Saturday’s long day of festival music (the late night jam session would wind down in the early hours of Sunday).
Jonny Dunn (trumpet) & Steve McGarvie (keyboards) played a half hour set at around eleven o’clock. Members of the Durham Alumni Big Band, the duo chose a tune, played it, suggested another one and played it. The audience comprised Clervaux’s regulars, the Saturday morning lycra-clad cyclists stopping by to refuel and the jazz diehards. All the Things You Are typified a tasteful set – Dunn the lyrical horn player, McGarvie the piano player perhaps better known as the Alumni’s alto/soprano saxophonist.
Al Wood (baritone sax) & Dean Stockdale (keyboards)
Al Wood’s cv is impressive – ex-Maynard Ferguson, Ken Mackintosh and countless gigs with a dizzying array of A-listers (Peter King, Danny Moss, Kenny Baker, Nat Adderley, Buddy Greco) and Dean Stockdale, the junior man of the partnership, has been schooled by the best in the business including Dave Newton and now playing GAS book gigs with the likes of Ruth Lambert and James Birkett and working with contemporary performers such as Johnny Hunter. Yorkshire based Wood plays all the saxes, trumpet and trombone. At this Darlington Jazz Festival weekend he wielded the big beast, the baritone. Coffee, tea, cake, chatter in the sunlit space, Wood and Stockdale played whatever took their fancy. Have You Met Miss Jones? then Autumn in New York, Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise, There Will Never be Another You and Wood going for it on St Thomas. Class playing from the duo.
More class playing was in the offing with the Baker siblings – Amy and Alex – next up. That festival dilemma cropped up – stay at Clervaux or walk around the corner to the Quakerhouse for the afternoon set in the bar. The Quakerhouse won out (the Bakers would be playing later at Central Hall, as indeed would Al Wood and Dean Stockdale).
Ruth Lambert Trio: Ruth Lambert (vocals), Giles Strong (guitar) & Mick Shoulder (double bass) Cheltenham bound. Darlington Jazz Festival to Cheltenham Jazz Festival, Ruth Lambert dropped by to open the afternoon’s entertainment at the Quakerhouse and then on to the BBC Introducing stage at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival later this week. Ah, such is the life of a superstar!
Time After Time – Lambert swinging as only she can. Silencing a pub crowd tells you all you need to know, we were listening to a great singer. Backed by Giles Strong, guitar and double bassist Mick Shoulder, Lambert’s set flew by. Everything Was Beautiful, Love for Sale, Shoulder’s How Could I? A pint of Green Mill’s Ella (it had to be!) then Skylark. A master class in jazz singing. Caravan, No Moon at All and to end, The Snake. Hey, there, Cheltenham – you’re in for a treat!
Noel Dennis (trumpet & flugelhorn) & Dean Stockdale (keyboards) That man Dean Stockdale strolled from Clervaux to the Quakerhouse to meet up once more with Noel Dennis. Their duo gig is a relatively new partnership and they’ve yet to play a wrong note. There is no Greater Love, Tom Harrell’s Moon Alley (Dennis, flugelhorn), Mingus’ Nostalgia in Times Square, a marvellous Beautiful Love, My Funny Valentine, Love for Sale (for the second time this afternoon) and to close, Now’s the Time. We’re still waiting for that wrong note. 
The Lindsay Hannon Plus: Lindsay Hannon (vocals), Mark Williams (guitar), John Pope (double bass) & Russ Morgan (drums)
With pianist James Harrison on tour with Philip Scofield, bandleader Lindsay Hannon called in a dep. Not any old dep, rather the never less than brilliant Mark Williams. The Quakerhouse bar doesn’t have much floor space placing drummer Russ Morgan partially out of view. No matter, what a player! The Papal presence of double bassist Mr. J Pope guaranteed a swinging set and Ms. Hannon started to sing. Decidedly ‘other’ material is Hannon’s thing. Always in key, expert voice projection, forever taking a chance, Hannon mixed self-penned numbers with several standards (The Very Thought of You, No More Blues with its impressive vocal gymnastics, some Monk and Miss Otis Regrets). This was Hannon excelling in a small combo setting, later in the evening, she would take on the challenge of performing to a somewhat larger gathering in Central Hall.
Russell.
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