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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

17444 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 718 of them this year alone and, so far, 100 this month (Oct. 10).

From This Moment On ...

October

Sat 12: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 12: Michael Woods @ Victoria Tunnel, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £12.00. (£10.00. adv.). Country blues guitar & vocals.
Sat 12: Nauta @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £13.28, £11.16, £9.04. A two-track recording launch gig.
Sat 12: Stuart Turner @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Rockabilly, rhythm & blues etc. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sat 12: Lapwing Jazz Trio @ The Ship Inn, Low Newton. 8:00pm. Free. New trio: Paula Whitty, Richard Herdman, Jude Murphy.

Sun 13: Am Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free.
Sun 13: Emma Wilson @ Tyne Bar, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. Blues.
Sun 13: Catfish Keith @ The Cluny. 7:00pm. Country blues.
Sun 13: Cath Stephens & Paul Grainger @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Stephens & Grainger, one third of a triple bill.
Sun 13: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.

Mon 14: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 14: Black is the Color of My Voice @ Hippodrome, Darlington. 7:30pm. Apphia Campbell’s one-woman show inspired by Nina Simone, performed by Nicholle Cherrie.

Tue 15: Jam session @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free. House trio: Alan Law (piano), Paul Grainger (double bass), Bailey Rudd (drums).

Wed 16: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 16: Cath Stephens’ improvisation workshop @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 4:30-6:00pm. Collaborative group focusing on vocal improvisations.
Wed 16: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 16: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.

Thu 17: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 17: Olivia Cuttill Quintet @ King’s Hall, Newcastle University. 1:15pm. Free.
Thu 17: Moonlight Serenade Orchestra UK: Glenn Miller & Big Band Spectacular @ Phoenix Theatre, Blyth. 7:30pm.
Thu 17: Merlin Roxby @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free. Ragtime piano. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Thu 17: Niffi Osiyemi Trio @ The Harbour View, Sunderland. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 17: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman’s Club, Middlesborough. Guests Jeremy McMurray (keys); Richie Emmerson (tenor sax); Mark Toomey (alto sax); Adrian Beadnell (bass). 8:30pm. Free.

Fri 18: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 18: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 18: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 18: Hot Club du Nord @ St Cuthbert’s, Crook. 7:30pm.
Fri 18: Chet Set @ Seventeen Nineteen, Hendon, Sunderland. 7:30pm. Pete Tanton & co.
Fri 18: Michael Woods @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. Doors 7:30pm (upstairs). A Hoodoo Blues dance & social event. £10.00. class & social (£10.00., £7.50., £5.00. social only). Michael Woods (country blues guitar) on stage 9:00pm.
Fri 18: East Coast Swing Band @ Hexham Abbey. 7:30pm. £9.00.
Fri 18: Ben Crosland Quartet @ Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. Opus 4 Jazz Club.
Fri 18: Durham University Jazz Society’s ‘High Standards’ @ Music Dept. Music Room, Divinity House, Palace Green, Durham University DH1 3RS. 8:009:30pm. Tel: 0191 334 1419. £7.00., £5.00.
Fri 18: Ray Stubbs R&B All Stars @ Blues Underground, Nelson St., Newcastle. 9:00pm. Free.

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

Tuesday, May 30, 2017

CD Review: Tommy Smith Quartet - Embodying the Light

Tommy Smith (tenor); Pete Johnstone (piano); Calum Gourlay (bass); Sebastiaan de Krom (drums).
(Review by Lance).
I'd become so used to thinking of Tommy Smith and the SNJO as being joined at the hip, and I use the word advisedly, that I'd almost forgotten what a formidable player he was in a small group setting. This tribute to John Coltrane puts the record straight.
He is to Scottish Jazz what Robbie Burns was to Scottish Poetry. With Smith, the best laid schemes of mice and jazzmen don't gang aft agley. In fact, on this disc, they don't gang agley at all. Over the 50 years since 'Trane ascended he's had many disciples but few, if any, have absorbed the complete canon as well as Scotland's own Trane. From the barnstorming Prestige/Blue Note period to the spiritual searching of the Atlantic/Impulse years Smith has it nailed. Not in a cloning manner but in a very personal way.

The opener, Transformation, a Smith original, sets the stall out with a Giant Steps-like blast that lasts forever and yet still didn't seem long enough!
Coltrane's Dear Lord is shorter. A hymn that, in the eye of an unbeliever, would be classed as a ballad. Believer or infidel, it's still 3 minutes of beauty.
Embodying the Light, another Smith original, has a familiar sequence that features Gourlay and Johnstone before Smith's grand entrance. He's like a bull in a china shop with the difference being that the porcelain remains unbroken, maybe enhanced!
Naima, one of Trane's 'signature dishes' is given 'signature' treatment by Smith. Amazingly Tommy was born on the day that 'Trane died and this was recorded 50 years later on the very same day. Who says there aren't mystical forces that guide our destiny?
Resolution's full of eastern promise. Johnstone resists the call to board the next flight to Mumbai and instead, heads off to JFK where, upon landing, takes a cab down to the Village Vanguard. Smith joins him - they take the scenic route.
The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost from the 1966 Meditations album wasn't intended to be a disco hit and it wasn't. Not even at the church social. However, in Jazz Heaven, I'm sure both JC's have given TS their blessing - it's quite incredible.
Summertime - when in doubt, play Summertime; just don't sing it. Tommy doesn't sing it but he does swing it as do his clansmen.
Embodying the Darkness, Smith's sequel to the title track touches on 'Trane's Sheets of Sound or, as one unbeliever used to say to me, Sounds of Sheet. de Krom shines a light on the darkness that avoids you stepping in the...
Transition another tour de force from Smith, more power piano from Johnstone (also a member of award winning band Square One who impressed listeners at both the Ushaw Festival and at a JNE gig at the Bridge Hotel last year) rounds off a truly great album.
I deliberately didn't listen to the Coltrane versions, Naima was the only one I knew, I didn't want any preconceived ideas and, whatever, this album stands on its own 8 feet.
Highly recommended.
Lance.

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