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Bebop Spoken There

Steve Fishwick: “I can’t get behind the attitude that new is always somehow better than old” - Jazz Journal, April 15, 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!"

Simon Spillett: A lovely review from the dean of jazz bloggers, Lance Liddle...

Postage

16034 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 15 years ago. 1041 of them this year alone and, so far, 73 this month (Nov. 27).

From This Moment On ...

November

Thu 30: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 30: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 7:30pm (7:00pm doors). Tickets: £25.00. inc. buffet. A Gatsby themed evening.
Thu 30: '58 Jazz Collective @ Hops and Cheese, 9-11 Tower St., Hartlepool, TS24 7HH. 7:30pm.
Thu 30: Jools Holland's R & B Orchestra @ Newcastle City Hall. 7:30pm.
Thu 30: Merlin Roxby @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Ragtime piano. A 'Jar on the Bar' gig.
Thu 30: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman's Club, Middlesbrough. Guest band night: Mark Toomey Quintet (Mark Toomey, sax; Paul Donnelly, guitar; Jeremy McMurray, keys; Peter Ayton, bass; Mark Robertson, drums). 9:00pm.

December
Fri 01: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Fri 01: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 01: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms, Monkseaton. 1:00pm.
Fri 01: Paul Skerritt @ All Saints’ Church, Eastgate, Co. Durham. 7:00pm. Xmas Tree Fest.
Fri 01: Alligator Gumbo @ Saltburn Community Hall. 7:30pm. SOLD OUT!
Fri 01: Nu Sound Brass @ Billy Bootlegger’s, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free.
Fri 01: Struggle Buggy w. Jim Murray @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Blind Pig Blues Club. Free. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sat 02: Paula Jackman's Jazz Masters @ St Augustine's Parish Centre, Darlington. 12:30pm. £10.00.
Sat 02: Play Jazz! workshop @ The Globe, Newcastle. 1:30pm. Tutor: Steve Glendinning. £25.00. Enrol at: www.jazz.coop.
Sat 02: Abbie Finn Trio @ Claypath Deli, Durham. 7:00pm.
Sat 02: Tenement Jazz Band @ John Marley Centre, Newcastle. Swing Tyne Winter Social. £8.00. + bf. Advance purchase only, no admission at the door. BYOB. Lindy hop workshop from 11:00am. £39.00.
Sat 02: Zoë Gilby Quartet @ The Masham, Hartburn Village, Stockton. 7:00pm. Feat. Noel Dennis.
Sat 02: Classic Swing @ The Nuthatch, 9 - 11 Bedford St, Middlesbrough TS1 2LL. 7:00-9:00pm. Classic Swing in trio format.
Sat 02: Paul Skerritt w. Danny Miller Big Band @ Westovian Theatre, South Shields. 7:30pm.
Sat 02: Vermont Big Band @ Whitley Bay FC. 7:30pm. £10.00. (inc. hot buffet). Tickets available from WBFC’s Seahorse pub club house.
Sat 02: Milne-Glendinning Band @ Ponteland Social Club, Northumberland. 7:30pm. £18.00 (inc. stotties & soup supper). A fundraiser for Hexham Constituency Labour Party.
Sat 02: Durham Dynamics & Basement Jazz @ Kingsgate Bar & Café, Durham Students’ Union. 7:30pm. £5.00. (£4.50. concs.). ‘Fab & Festive’. A cappella & jazz. Abba, Mariah Carey & more.
Sat 02: Tom Remon & Laurence Harrison @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sat 02: Rendezvous Jazz @ Red Lion, Earsdon. 8:00pm. Xmas party night inc. buffet & special raffle. £3.00.
Sat 02: Groovetrain @ The Unionist Club, Laygate, South Shields. 9:00pm.

Sun 03: The Central Bar Quartet @ Central Bar, Gateshead. 2:00pm. £10.00. The Central Bar Quartet plays Lou Donaldson’s Gravy Train. Featuring Jamie Toms.
Sun 03: Paul Skerritt @ Smith’s Arms, Carlton, Stockton-on-Tees. 7:00pm.
Sun 03: Johnny Hunter Quartet @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.
Sun 03: Jam session @ The Schooner, Gateshead. 8:00pm. Free.

Mon 04: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Mon 04: Northern Monkey Brass Band @ People’s Kitchen, Bath Lane, Newcastle. From 5:30pm. On-street gig supporting the work of the People’s Kitchen charity. Wrap up warm! Donate!
Mon 04: Michael Young Trio w Lindsay Hannon @ The Engine Room, Sunderland. 7:00pm. Free.
Mon 04: James Birkett Trio @ The Black Bull, Blaydon. 8:00pm. £8.00.
Mon 04: Durham University Jazz Orchestra + Durham University Big Band @ Durham Castle DH1 3RW. 8:30pm. £6.00.; £5.00. concs; £4.00. DSM. ‘Jazzy Christmas’.

Tue 05: Customs House Big Band @ All Saints Church, Cleadon. 7:00pm. Concert in the church hall. BYOB.
Tue 05: Jam session @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free. House trio: Michael Young, Paul Grainger, Sid White. The best free show in town!

Wed 06: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 06: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 8:00pm. Free. Note later start time, concert performance (open to the public).
Wed 06: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm.

Monday, November 14, 2016

Greg Abate & Paul Edis @ Gala Theatre, Durham - November 11

Greg Abate (alto); Paul Edis (piano)
(Review by Brian Ebbatson/Photo courtesy of Jerry Edis/Collage courtesy of Brian Ebbatson)
Friday lunchtime at the Gala in Durham and an audience of 100 await expectantly the return of New England reedman/flautist Greg Abate and Northeast keyboardist Paul Edis. They launched straight into their programme of seven extended numbers and it was clear from the start that the prevailing spirit behind the music was Greg’s mentor and recording partner Phil Woods who passed away in September last year. Five of the pieces played were either from collaborations with Woods, from tributes to him, or tributes by Woods to fellow musicians.
They began with a favourite Abate opener, Jerome Kern’s All the Things You Are*, Greg stating the opening phrases on alto before launching into the melody and into an extended alto solo, Paul picking out chords and harmonies behind him, urging him on, before Greg hands over to Paul to plot his own path through the possibilities of the song. Greg came back with further elaborations on the theme culminating on a soaring and dipping finish.
The pace is slower for the next piece, The End of a Love Affair, which Greg features as a duet with Phil Woods on Kindred Spirits. Greg opens again but quickly Paul and he are taking lines in turn. As the solos develop a bluesy feel emerges, each player quoting parts of the theme as they develop their solos. They close with more exchanges before Greg finishes in a swirl from the bottom to the top of the register.
Between numbers Greg explained (if I heard him properly) that after visiting the North East last year he had left his flute on the tube in Glasgow. He had recovered it but because of the exigencies of his touring arrangements this year (he had left Cheltenham at 5.00am this morning and had to leave for Maidenhead early on Saturday) he had left it and his tenor at his Leicester base, a pity as his flute playing last year was exquisite.
On his 2015 CD Motif the flute features on the next number, his own composition Morning of the Leaves, a beautiful jazz waltz, Greg summoning up the mood of spring (or was it this autumn?) on his alto, quoting as we went along from Softly as the Morning Sunrise, Paul matching his lyricism on keys.
Greg now returned to Phil Woods and their recent joint CD (Woods’ last recording) Kindred Spirits, with Harold Arlen’s A Sleeping Bee, another beautiful melody. Greg begins with a delicate intro, a short bridge, then picks up the pace to introduce the full song line. Paul supports on piano as Greg stretches out once again with an intense but controlled solo, then Paul takes to over with his own explorations. Greg returns ranging to the lower registers before finishing on another bluesy, boppy flourish around the theme.
Greg reflected on the challenges of playing as a duet without bass and drums support, and how this helps reveal more from the material. Harder work for both, but perhaps a promise for even more exciting music at the Jazz Café in the evening with the full quartet.
Now the concert was in full swing and the final three numbers brought the audience to repeated rapturous applause. Greg jogged Paul’s memory with the chords and riffs of Charlie Parker’s Yardbird Suite before they set off through Bird’s masterpiece. Brilliant solos from both, phrases traded, quotes from amongst other numbers prompted by their improvisations, The Lady is a Tramp. It felt as if this is what they had been building up to in all the previous numbers.
A ballad, Moonlight in Vermont followed. Paul opened improvising on the chords, Greg took the theme, Paul picks up on his suggestions and takes the melody forward, before both take long solos, again quoting from other songs prompted by their improvisations. It’s as if they are picking up ideas from deep in their imagination and knowledge of the music, a sort of collage that had me musing of George Braque pictures or Kurt Schwitters assemblages.
The final number was Cedar’s Blues, another piece from Kindred Spirits, a tribute by Phil Woods to Cedar Walton. It’s a good paced blues, space for striding piano and almost funky alto, perhaps derived from Greg’s time with Ray Charles. Both players are clearly enjoying themselves, throwing phrases back and forth to each other as they develop the piece. Paul’s solo reminds me again of Horace Silver or was it Wyn Kelly? They come back to what we think is the final phrase, then suddenly Greg morphs the piece into Blue Monk, both stretch the theme out with lengthy solos building up to as real climax as Greg returns to Cedar’s Blues for a long drawn out swirling finish.
Brian E
*(Greg can be heard playing All the Things You Are here.


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