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Bebop Spoken There

Spasmo Brown: “Jazz is an ice cream sandwich! It's the Fourth of July! It's a girl with a waterbed!”. (Syncopated Times, July, 2024).

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...

Josh Weir: I love the writing on bebop spoken here... I think the work you are doing is amazing.

Postage

17372 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 656 of them this year alone and, so far, 61 this month (Sept. 17).

From This Moment On ...

September

Fri 20: Lindsay Hannon’s Tom Waits for No Man @ Gala Theatre, Durham. 1:00pm. £8.00. SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Rob Hall & Chick Lyall @ The Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 1:00pm. Free (donations). SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 20: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 20: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 20: Leeway @ 1719, Hendon, Sunderland. 7:30pm. The Old Black Cat Jazz Club. CANCELLED!
Fri 20: Gaz Hughes Trio @ Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. Opus 4 Jazz Club.

Sat 21: Jason Isaacs @ Seaburn STACK, Seaburn. 1:00-2:45pm. Free.
Sat 21: Vieux Carré Hot Four @ The Beehive, Hartley Lane, Earsdon Whitley Bay NE25 0SZ. 4:30pm-6:30pm.
Sat 21: Baghdaddies @ Two by Two, Albion Row, Byker, Newcastle NE6 1RQ. 6:00pm.
Sat 21: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Northumberland Club, Jesmond, Newcastle. 7:00pm. SOLD OUT!
Sat 21: Jude Murphy & Alan Law @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sun 22: More Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: Jason Isaacs @ St James’ STACK, Newcastle. 2:30-4:30pm. Free.
Sun 22: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ Queen’s Hall, Hexham. 3:00pm.
Sun 22: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: Richard Herdman @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sun 22: Remy CB Band @ Blues Underground, Nelson St., Newcastle. 8:30pm. Free. Remi, 2024 Newcastle Uni graduate, superb soul/blues voice!

Mon 23: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Paul Booth with the Paul Edis Trio @ The Black Bull, Blaydon. 8:00pm. £10.00. A Blaydon Jazz Club 40th anniversary concert! SOLD OUT!

Tue 24: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ Newcastle House Hotel, Rothbury. 7:30pm. £12.00. (£10.00. adv. from Tully’s of Rothbury). Coquetdale Jazz.
Tue 24: Sarah Gillespie @ The Cluny, Newcastle. 7:30pm (doors). £16.50. Duo performance with Chris Montague.

Wed 25: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 25: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 25: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.
Wed 25: Moonlight Serenade Orchestra UK: Glenn Miller & Big Band Spectacular @ Middlesbrough Theatre. 7:30pm.

Thu 26: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 26: Gateshead Jazz Appreciation Society @ Brunswick Methodist Church, Newcastle NE1 7BJ. 2:00pm. £4.00. ‘Contemporary Jazz & the Piano’.
Thu 26: The New 58 Jazz Collective @ Hops & Cheese, Hartlepool. 7:30pm. Free.
Thu 26: Jo Harrop & Friends @ Hexham Abbey. 8:00pm. ‘An Evening with Jo Harrop & Friends’. A Hexham Abbey Festival of Music & Arts event. £20.00., £5.00. child/student.
Thu 26: Neil Yates & Tom Remon @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Thu 26: Loco House Band @ Bar Loco, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 26: Tees Hot Club @ Dorma’s Club, Middlesborough. 8:30pm. Free. Mark Toomey, Neil Brodie, Graham Thompson, Adrian Beadnell.

Thursday, January 26, 2017

CD Review: The Scottish National Jazz Orchestra with Bill Evans - Beauty & the Beast

Part 1: After a Kentonesque intro (had Kenton still been around) Bill Evans, who isn't a reincarnated pianist nor an aka Yusef Lateef, erupts on soprano. This is definitely the beast.
Part 2: A change from major to minor mood suggests that the beast is eying up a young lady who has entered his castle. The mood now is Ellington/Mingus and Evans is both beauty and beast as the scene changes. Even if this had been called Fish and Chips it would still have been one magnificent piece of writing and playing. Oh dear, I think the young woman is in turmoil - where is daddy?
Part 3: Steve Hamilton brings this one in. Building tension. Is beauty running around trying to escape or is she fighting an attraction for the beast who is now blowing tenor? He's coming on strong.
This is wilder than Kenton ever dreamed of - makes City of Glass sound like Mantovani!
Part 4: Tenor blows a cadenza then, once again the minor key. Something big going down here. There's a Disney movie doing the rounds but the soundtrack couldn't be any more atmospheric than this! Wild tenor playing - has our girl been deflowered? Melodic interlude, is this love or lust?
Part 5: Gentle. Beauty, reflects on her status, is she in love with the beast? The soprano playing suggests she might be.
Part 6: The arranging, as it is throughout is perfection. Think Stan Getz's Focus with Eddie Sauter. Evans and Smith are well up for it, maybe even surpassing it. The tenor playing is wild, has the beast gone crazy? Has love driven him over the edge? He wouldn't be the first!
Part 7: A melancholy opening, soprano in a romantic mood but, [me] having, belatedly, read the fairy tale (I should have done that first) perhaps it's the discovery that the beast appears to have died of a broken heart due to the object of his affection being late in returning to the castle - aren't they always? Soprano runs the changes like a woman frantic at her loss taking it out on his pet dragon. She didn't care that the beast was ugly - she'd seen beyond that and loved him for his inner self. She cries and that tear lands on his cheek and he is alive again and they both live happily ever after!
This is, perhaps, the ultimate jazz concerto. The composing, the arranging, the rehearsing - the time even these top guys must have spent getting it right must have been awesome. Tommy Smith and his clan presented Evans with a put up or shut up challenge. A challenge he accepted and he certainly put up! My only criticism is that I'd rather Smith had given each movement a title rather than Parts 1 - 7. That way I wouldn't have had to put my totally wrong take on the portrayal.
That aside, a magnificent achievement by all concerned.
The CD was released in October last year and, if Jazz Journal had invited me to take part in their annual Critics Poll it would have been high on the list.
Available on Spartacus Records/samples.
Lance.
Ryan Quigley, Ewan Mains, Lorne Cowieson, Tom McNiven (trumpets); Chris Grieve, Kevin Garrity, Michael Owers, Lorna McDonald (trombones); Martin Kershaw, Paul Towndrow (alto); Tommy Smith, Konrad Wiszniewski (tenor); Bill Fleming (baritone); Steve Hamilton (piano); Kevin Glasgow (bass); Alyn Cosker (drums).

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