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Bebop Spoken There

Billy Boy Arnold: “As long as you don't think old you're good.” - DownBeat, December, 2023.

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

16051 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 15 years ago. 1058 of them this year alone and, so far, 12 this month (Dec. 6).

From This Moment On ...

December

Mon 11: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 11: Interim Final Recitals @ Newcastle University. Details TBC.

Tue 12: Stu Collingwood Organ Trio @ Forum Music Centre, Darlington. 7:00pm. £10.00.

Wed 13: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 13: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 13: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.
Wed 13: Bold Big Band @ Cluny 2, Newcastle. 7:30pm.
Wed 13: Giles Strong Quartet @ Alphabetti Theatre, Newcastle. 7:30pm.

Thu 14: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 14: Hot Fingers @ The Lubetkin Theatre, Peterlee. 7:00pm. £10.00.
Thu 14: After Hours Student Jazz Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 14: Merlin Roxby @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. . Free. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Thu 14: Niffi Osiyemi Trio @ Harbour View, Sunderland. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 14: Mo Scott ‘Little Mo’s Festive Appearance’ @ The Schooner, Gateshead. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 14: Tees Hot Club w. Kevin Eland, Josh Bentham, Garry Hadfield, Adrian Beadnell @ Dorman’s Club, Middlesbrough. 9:00pm.

Fri 15: Paul Edis @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 1:00pm. SOLD OUT!
Fri 15: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 15: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 15: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms, Monkseaton. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 15: Paul Skerritt @ Black Horse Inn, Crook. From 7:00pm.
Fri 15: Paul Edis: A Jazzy Christmas @ St Cuhtbert's Centre, Crook. 7:30pm. £15.00. SOLD OUT! Waiting list open.
Fri 15: Zoë Gilby Trio @ Seventeen Nineteen, Hendon, Sunderland. 7:30pm. £12.00. POSTPONED!
Fri 15: Strictly Smokin' Big Band @ Gosforth Civic Theatre, Newcastle. 8:00pm. First night of two. SOLD OUT!
Fri 15: Darlington Big Band @ Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. £10.00. Opus 4 Jazz Club.
Fri 15: Baghdaddies @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 8:00pm. £14.00.; £10.00.

Sat 16: Paul Edis: A Jazzy Christmas @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 2:00pm. A Jazzy Christmas + Jambone.
Sat 16: Porritt & Barrett & Friends Xmas Special @ Cullercoats Watch House. 7:00pm. £4.00.
Sat 16: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 16: Red Kites Jazz Band @ The Staithes Café, Gateshead. 7:00pm--9:00pm.
Sat 16: Hayley's Little Big Band @ Ellingham Village Hall, Chathill. 7:30pm. £12.00., £8.00.
Sat 16: Paul Edis: A Jazzy Christmas @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 8:00pm.
Sat 16: Strictly Smokin' Big Band @ Gosforth Civic Theatre, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Second night of two.

Sun 17: Red Kites Jazz Band @ Gibside Chapel, nr. Rowlands Gill. 1:00-2:30pm.
Sun 17: Paul Skerritt @ Hibou Blanc, Newcastle. 2:00pm.
Sun 17: Revolutionaires @ Tyne Bar, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. Rock ‘n’ roll excellence!
Sun 17: Tweed River Jazz Band @ Barrels Alehouse, Berwick. 7:00pm. Free.
Sun 17: The Globe Xmas Party @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:00pm. Free. Multi-bill inc. David Gray’s Flextet + jam session.
Sun 17: Paul Edis: A Jazzy Christmas @ Queen's Hall, Hexham. 7:30pm. £17.00., £15.00.
Sun 17: Hayley's Little Big Band @ Amble Parish Hall. 7:30pm. £12.00., £6.00.
Sun 17: Snake Davis Trio @ St John’s Hall, Snods Edge, Shotley Bridge DH8 9TJ. 7:30pm. £15.00. from 07766 037893.

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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