Total Pageviews

Bebop Spoken There

Steve Coleman: ''If you don't keep learning, your mind slows down. Use it or lose it''. (DownBeat, January 2025).

The Things They Say!

This is a good opportunity to say thanks to BSH for their support of the jazz scene in the North East (and beyond) - it's no exaggeration to say that if it wasn't for them many, many fine musicians, bands and projects across a huge cross section of jazz wouldn't be getting reviewed at all, because we're in the "desolate"(!) North. (M & SSBB on F/book 23/12/24)

Postage

17733 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 17 years ago. 53 of them this year alone and, so far, 53 this month (Jan. 20).

From This Moment On ...

January 2025

Wed 22: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 22: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.
Wed 22: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 22: Pasadena Roof Orchestra @ Fire Station, Sunderland. 7:30pm.

Thu 23: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, Holystone. 1:00pm. Free. Fortnightly.
Thu 23: Jazz Appreciation North East @ Brunswick Methodist Church, Newcastle NE1 7BJ. 2:00pm. £4.00. Subject: Obituaries 2024.
Thu 23: Jason Isaacs @ St James’ STACK, Newcastle. 4:30-6:30pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Thu 23: Pedal Point Trio @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Fri 24: Zoë Gilby Quartet @ The Gala, Durham. 1:00pm. SOLD OUT!
Fri 24: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 24: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 24: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 24: Creakin’ Bones & the Sunday Dinners @ Lindisfarne Social Club, Wallsend. 9:00pm. Admission: TBC. Jazz, blues , jump jive, rock ‘n’ roll.

Sat 25: Boys of Brass @ St James’ STACK, Newcastle. 3:30-5:30pm. Free.
Sat 25: New '58 Jazz Collective @ Jackson's Wharf, Hartlepool. 6:30pm (doors). Free. A Burns' Night event. Jazz, swing, funk, soul, blues etc.
Sat 25: Edison Herbert Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 25: Red Kites Jazz @ Parish Hall, St Barnabas’ Church, Rowlands Gill. 7:30pm. £10.00. BYOB (tea & coffee available), raffle. Proceeds to St Barnabas’ Church. Performance feat. Shayo (vocals).
Sat 25: Jack & Jay’s Songbook @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sun 26: Musicians Unlimited @ Jackson’s Wharf, Hartlepool. 1:00pm. Free.
Sun 26: Graham Hardy Eclectic Quartet @ Queen’s Hall, Hexham. 3:00pm.
Sun 26: Ruth Lambert Trio @ The Juke Shed, Union Quay, North Shields. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 26: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 26: Jazz Jam Sandwich! @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sun 26: Tweed River Jazz Band @ Barrels Ale House, Berwick-upon-Tweed. 7:30pm. Free.
Sun 26: Gratkowski, Tramontana, Beresford, Affifi @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm. £12.00. JNE.
Sun 26: Jazz Jam @ Fabio’s, Saddler St., Durham. 8:00pm. Free. A Durham University Jazz Society promotion. All welcome.

Mon 27: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.

Tue 28: ???

Wed 29: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 29: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.
Wed 29: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).

Thu 30: Matters Unknown (aka Jonathan Enser, Nubiyan Twist) + support TBA @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 8:00pm (7:00pm doors). £12.22 (gig & food); £9:04 (gig only).
Thu 30: Soznak @ The Mill Tavern, Hebburn. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 30: Struggle Buggy @ Harbour View, Roker, Sunderland. 8:00pm. Free. Rhythm & blues.

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

Saturday, May 21, 2016

Thomas Strønen – Time is a Blind Guide @ Sage Gateshead. May 20

Thomas Strønen (percussion), Kit Downes (piano), Lucy Railton (cello), Håka Aase (violin) & Ole Morten Vågan (double bass)
(Review by Russell/Photo courtesy of Ken Drew).
A busy Friday evening at Sage Gateshead – the Royal Northern Sinfonia in Sage One, the soulful Laura Mvula playing to a standing-room-only crowd in Sage Two and the Anglo-Norwegian project of Thomas Strønen and friends in the Northern Rock Foundation Hall.  
The cabaret-style layout in the flexible studio space of the Northern Rock helps engender an informal air, making the connection between performer and audience more immediate. Percussionist Thomas Strønen’s Time is a Blind Guide project recorded an album a year or so ago and it is only now that the musicians were able to commit to a short tour such is the busy schedule of all concerned. This Sage Gateshead date, the first of four concerts in four days (London, Birmingham and Norwich to follow), renewed Strønen’s connections with the Borough of Gateshead. 
The tall, tanned percussionist recalled a gig at Caedmon Hall with Iain Ballamy in their Food days, long before the Norman Foster-designed Sage Gateshead first laid its foundations. Time is a Blind Guide (its inspiration Anne Michaels' novel Fugitive Pieces) is an elegant conception. Countrymen Håka Aase (violin) and Ole Morten Vågan (double bass) share Strønen’s cool Nordic mindset; still, at rest, listening. The quintet’s British component – Kit Downes (piano) and cellist Lucy Railton – have a clear empathy for the music, similarly stilled, at rest, yet fully engaged.
Baka, The Drowned City and Lost Souls – three pieces, without pause, to open the concert with Strønen’s subsequent observation: Cheerful and positive! The Norwegian was aware that the music was anything but foot-tapping Dr Jazz material. He referred to the current tour as a tour of ‘cultural capitals’. Sage Gateshead, Kings Place, London, CBSO Centre, Birmingham and Norwich Playhouse succeed as bastions of culture making possible gigs such as Strønen’s Time is a Blind Guide. A final piece (Fugitive Pieces) developed from a typical minimalist opening to something approaching sophisticated swing via Strønen’s virtuosic brush work. The Jazz Police went home satisfied.
Tell Tale: David Ferris (piano), James Banner (double bass) & Ric Yarborough (drums)
Earlier, a support set featured the Birmingham-based trio Tell Tale. Recent graduates of the Birmingham Conservatoire hot house, this half hour set proved to be a real bonus. Structured improv (rehearsed to the nth) drawing on Dostoyevsky, Conlon Nancarrow – Numbers (for Conlon), comp. James Banner – and French impressionist painter Corot, Tell Tale maintained the ‘High Art’ connection, a million crochets away from N’Awlins.    
Russell.

No comments :

Blog Archive