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Bebop Spoken There

John McLaughlin: '' A Love Supreme coincided with my search for meaning in life". (DownBeat, March 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

17864 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 17 years ago. 185 of them this year alone and, so far,32 this month (March10).

From This Moment On ...

MARCH 2025.

Tues 11: Solea @ Earthlings, the Healing Café, 94 Buckingham St., Newcastle, NE4 5QR. 7:00-8:45pm. Food available if ordered before 6:30pm. New band: Johannes Dalhuijsen (tenor sax, bass clarinet); Richard Herdman (guitar); Nick Bagnall (bass guitar); John Hirst (drums).
Tue 11: Giles Strong Quartet @ Newcastle House Hotel, Rothbury. 7:30pm.

Wed 12: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 12: Jam session @ The Tannery, Gilesgate, Hexham. 7:00-9:00pm. Free.
Wed 12: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 12: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.

Thu 13: The Exu + Matt Cliffe @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm.
Thu 13: Oh La La! @ Allendale Village Hall, Northumberland. 7:30pm. £12.00.; £6.00. child. Fifi La Mer (accordion, vocals), Oliver Wilby (reeds).
Thu 13: Fiona Finden’s Jazz Express @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Fri 14: Pete Tanton’s Chet Set @ Auckland Castle, Bishop Auckland. 1:00pm. £8.00.
Fri 14: Paul Taylor @ Jesmond Library, Newcastle. 1:00-2:00pm. £5.00. at the door. Second Friday in the month lunchtime concert series.
Fri 14: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 14: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 14: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 14: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 4:00-6:00pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Fri 14: Brass Funkeys + Dilutey Juice @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £12.00., £10.00., £8.00.
Fri 14: Oh La La! @ Edmundbyers Village Hall, Co. Durham. 7:30pm. £12.00.; £10.00. (additional £5.00. supper option, ordered in advance). Fifi La Mer (accordion, vocals), Oliver Wilby (reeds).
Fri 14: The Collective @ Pilgrim, Newcastle. 7:30pm. £8.50.
Fri 14: Bridget Metcalfe Quintet @ St George’s Venue, Park Road, Hartlepool. 7:30pm.

Sat 15: Hot Teapots @ St Augustine’s Parish Centre, Darlington. 12:30pm.
Sat 15: Creakin’ Bones @ Billy Bootleggers. Ouseburn, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free.
Sat 15: Joseph Carville Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 15: Is This Jazz? @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm. Tickets: www.eventbrite.co.uk. Performances by Mu Quintet, Jinjé, A Brief Utopia, John Pope & Co + André Marmot (author of Unapologetic Expression: The Inside Story of the UK Jazz Explosion) in conversation + DJ sets ‘til 3:00am. ‘A Festival of New Jazz’.
Sat 15: Vintage Explosion @ The Cluny, Newcastle. 7:30pm. SOLD OUT!
Sat 15: Alligator Gumbo @ The Forum, Darlington. 7:30pm. £15.00.
Sat 15: One Night Standards @ The White Room, Stanley. 8:00pm. £8.67 (inc. bf). Note - previously advertised Salty Dogs cancelled.
Sat 15: Howlin’ Mat @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Blues guitar.

Sun 16: Jason Isaacs @ STACK, Exchange Sq., Middlesbrough. 1:00-2:45pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Sun 16: Paul Skerritt @ Hibou Blanc, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free. Vocalist Skerritt working with backing tapes.
Sun 16: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 16: Pearl Blossoms @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Ragtime.
Sun 16: Hot 8 Brass Band @ Wylam Brewery. 7:30pm. ‘Big Tuba Tour’.
Sun 16: ARQ @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.
Sun 16: Air4ce @ The Cluny, Newcastle. 8:30pm (8:00pm doors). £12.00.; £10.00. Tom Atkinson’s all-star band (line-up inc. Lindsay Hannon & Sue Ferris).
Sun 16: Jazz Jam @ Fabio’s, Saddler St., Durham. 8:00pm. Free. A Durham University Jazz Society promotion. All welcome.

Mon 17: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 17: Jamie Toms Quartet @ The Black Bull, Blaydon. 8:00pm. £10.00.

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

Monday, February 27, 2017

CD Review - sort of - Tim Armacost: Time Being.

Tim Armacost (tenor); David Kikoski (piano); Robert Hurst (bass); Jeff' Tain' Watts (drums).
(Review by Lance).
My kind of tenor playing! My kind of jazz! Armacost is one of those blowing guys that catch your attention from chorus one. He's Blue Note, Prestige, Riverside - those labels would have reached out to him way back when.
To be honest, I didn't quite follow the blurb and it made me think I was cheating by just listening and enjoying!
Then I did think about it and played a Hank Mobley CD.
I Stopped thinking.
(Blurb)
The beginnings of this debut Whirlwind release as leader, from acclaimed Los Angeles-born tenor saxophonist Tim Armacost, tell a fascinating tale. A marquee player on the New York and Japanese scenes for many years, with an extensive discography and countless live and recorded collaborations to his name in the US, Europe and Asia (including the New York Standards Quartet recordings on this label), the clear direction for Time Being arrived, remarkably, out of the blue.
As Armacost elaborates: “I pictured myself playing Ornette Coleman’s Lonely Woman in the studio with a trio – double bassist Robert Hurst and drummer Jeff ‘Tain’ Watts. Tain was, in terms of time signature, out on his own, and Bob and I were communicating with each other independently of what he was playing. But what Tain was doing was so incredibly attractive – so fiery and so beautiful – that we both really wanted to go over and be part of that; yet we already had this thing that we had to do together. That whole idea of people relating to each other in the time, but in a non-traditional way, and creating tension which would eventually be resolved by them going over to play together, was something I’d never tried before – and the concept was really exciting. To achieve this, technology might have been the answer. But in the end, we decided to record in Tain’s studio, in an intimate live environment with no separation” (occasional left/right panning helps with the visualisation). “So for my compositions and arrangements, I needed to imagine the ideas happening in real time; and fortunately, with Tain and Bob on board – some of the most swinging musicians on the planet – there was a great, combined willingness for exploration, to make it happen.” Joining the trio on selected tracks is pianist David Kikoski, providing elegant, rippling color to numbers such as ‘The Next 20’ and ‘One and Four’.
Through the dedication of these accomplished artists, such a challenging brief has evolved into a project which is incredibly organic, purposeful and sumptuously swinging. The three ‘Sculptures’ on the album are very much an expression of this structured experimentation. ‘Phase Shift’ is modelled on an ‘X’ formation, as Armacost and Watts converge along the left tempo pathways, with Hurst on the right until saxophonist and bassist change places (an E flat to C piano key-change marks the crossover point) – technical in construction, but an exhilarating listen. In ‘Tempus Funkit’, Armacost independently visits the rhythms of drummer and bassist; and the particle-like conflict of ‘All The Things You Could Become In The Large Hadron Collider’ (based on ‘All The Things You Are’) is also a playful reference to Charles Mingus’ ‘All The Things You Could Be By Now If Sigmund Freud’s Wife Was Your Mother’.
‘Lonely Woman’ – the seed of this album which germinated so many possibilities – features a call-and-response between tenor and bass (with each saying, “Check out the way I’m playing the melody”), initiating their own improvisations until the drums home in on the bassist (as Tim puts it, “He can’t resist”). So the differing musical tensions are intentionally part of the unplanned dialogue present throughout this recording. In title track ‘Time Being’, the trio divides when tenor moves to a different tempo, with Hurst following, and Watts reaching them later – as Armacost enthuses: “When we all come back together, the pay-off is really delicious!” Pacey ’53rd Street’ is inspired by the blues melody of Thelonious Monk’s ’52nd Street’; there’s a fine, percussively buoyant interpretation of Monk’s ‘Teo’; and feisty, original composition ‘Alawain’ says so much about this trio’s collective, impassioned spirit.
Tim Armacost describes the session as being playful, wild and serious: “It has been a real source of joy, for me, to see such open musicians willing to make an attempt at something we’ve never done before; and especially when things got kinda interesting, and we started smiling – that was a really special, even relaxed experience. I hope that, although this has a demanding concept at its roots, listeners can pick up on its lyrical, singing qualities. The audience is very much part of the conversation – we’re doing this thing together, and we invite you in… to have fun!”


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