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Bebop Spoken There

Kurt Elling: ''There's something to learn from every musician you play with''. (DownBeat, December 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

17586 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 860 of them this year alone and, so far, 5 this month (Dec. 2).

From This Moment On ...

December

Tue 10: Customs House Big Band @ All Saints Church Hall, Cleadon. 7:30pm. £6.00. The CHBB’s annual Xmas concert featuring Ruth Lambert. A BYOB gig!

Wed 11: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 11: Cath Stephens’ improvisation workshop @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 4:30-6:00pm. Collaborative group focusing on vocal improvisations.
Wed 11: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 11: The Tannery Jam Session @ The Tannery, Gilesgate, Hexham. 7:00-9:00pm. Free. Second Wednesday in the month.
Wed 11: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.

Thu 12: Vieux Carré Hot 4 @ Spanish City, Whitley Bay. 12 noon. £27.00. (inc. three -course meal).
Thu 12: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 5:00-6:45pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Thu 12: Stuart Turner @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Thu 12: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman’s Club, Middlesborough. 8:30pm. Free. Guests: Jeremy McMurray (keys); Mark Toomey (alto sax); Donna Hewitt (tenor sax); Kevin Eland (trumpet); Ron Smith (bass).

Fri 13: Dean Stockdale Trio @ Auckland Castle, Bishop Auckland. 1:00pm. £8.00.
Fri 13: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 13: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 13: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 13: Bellavana @ Revoluçion de Cuba, Newcastle. 3:00-5:00pm. Free.
Fri 13: Joe Steels Trio @ The Pele, Corbridge. 7:00pm. Free.
Fri 13: Customs House Big Band @ Stocksfield Community Association. 7:00pm. Featuring Ruth Lambert.
Fri 13: Paul Edis & Friends: A Jazzy Xmas @ St Cuthbert’s Centre, Crook. 7:30pm. £15.00.
Fri 13: Strictly Smokin’ Big Band @ Gosforth Civic Theatre, Newcastle. 7:30pm. £19.00. + bf. First night of two.
Fri 13: Ransom Van @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Fri 13: Boys of Brass @ Hoochie Coochie, Newcastle. 9:00pm. £10.00.

Sat 14: Jambone @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 6:15pm. Free but ticketed.
Sat 14: Abbie Finn Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm.
Sat 14: Red Kites Jazz @ Staiths Café, Autumn Dr., Gateshead. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 14 Lapwing Jazz Trio @ Three Sheets to the Wind, Alnwick. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 14: Strictly Smokin’ Big Band @ Gosforth Civic Theatre, Newcastle. 7:30pm. £19.00. + bf. Second night of two.
Sat 14: Papa G’s Troves @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sun 15: Musicians Unlimited @ Jackson’s Wharf, Hartlepool. 12 noon. £8.50. Xmas party feat. Musicians Unlimited + Customs House Big Band. SOLD OUT!
Sun 15: Paul Edis & Friends: A Jazzy Xmas @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 2:00pm.
Sun 15: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 15: Mitch Laddie Band @ Tyne Bar, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. Superb blues power trio.
Sun 15: Leeway @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sun 15: Tweed River Jazz Band @ Barrels Ale House, Berwick. 7:00pm. Free.
Sun 15: Paul Edis & Friends: A Jazzy Xmas @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 8:00pm.
Sun 15: Alligator Gumbo @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.

Mon 16: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 16: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Wheatsheaf, Benton Sq., Whitley Road, Palmersville NE12 9SU. Tel: 0191 266 8137. 12 noon. £9.95. ‘Festive Turkey Dinner’. Book now: 0191 266 8137.
Mon 16: Paul Edis & Friends: A Jazzy Xmas @ The Fire Station, Sunderland. 7:30pm.

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

Friday, June 16, 2017

Chaka Khan @ 02 Academy, Newcastle, June 12.

(Review by Steve T)
The last time Chaka Khan played in Newcastle, you wouldn't get a Hoochie Coochie round with change from £200 so, at just under £40, I couldn't afford to miss this and clearly, others felt the same with this spacious, greater capacity, venue crammed.
It was always my intention, with number one son gone, to get back to some good ole rock n soul, but does she have any credibility or anything to do with Jazz? I've all but given up trying to second guess what else people listen to besides Jazz. As fellow Black Musics, blues and soul seem to me to be the most natural bedfellows, though I also get modern classical music and experimental rock. Hatred of all things charts and media strike me as given, but it seems young people and people with different routes into Jazz have entirely contrary sets of givens.
First question about Chaka is does she do Rufus? The short, easy answer is yes but the longer answer was swiftly confirmed when the second song was Tell me Something Good, their first hit, from 73. This was followed by a run of Rufus cuts, but the sound was so poor it was often difficult to discern what they were beyond they weren't any of my favourites, but served as a reminder of what a stonkin, fonkin band they were in the early/mid-seventies.
All on stage sat for a song she wrote for the film Clockers, which was followed by What you Gonna do for me, perhaps her best solo track (the album includes a version of Night in Tunisia) and the finest moment of the three sides live album Stompin at the Savoy which reunited her with Rufus.
My Funny Valentine, which wasn't but could just have easily been on the album of Jazz standards she made with Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson, Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke and Lenny White.
The announcement of a woman’s song was greeted by an explosion, the ladies, dominant in the audience singing their collective hearts out I'm Every Woman. Easy to look back and dismiss it as disco but it was her first post Rufus track and really didn't seem like a 'sell-out', but was one of the last credible disco records before the inevitable appropriation by whitey, the charts and media.
Encore Aint Nobody, centrepiece of the aforementioned one side studio album by Rufus, upped the anti a little further, the ladies once again, vocal and loud. Strangely no I Feel for You, particularly given Prince’s recent acquisition of genius status.
Never one of the great soul singers, she squawks and wails and gargles and yells and screeches. Her band were hot, despite a second guitarist doing Hendrix style posturing while you couldn't even hear whether he was any good. The three backing singers were all better than her and I think when they arrived many wondered which one is Chaka Khan. A friend of mine had pizza with her following her appearance on The Tube many years ago so I already knew that she's tiny.
Just about worth the effort and expense.
Steve T.

3 comments :

Patti D (on F/b) said...

Oh, wow - I saw her at Hoochie a couple of years ago ...... one of those unforgettable nights too! I missed this one though ....... silly me!

Lance said...

Like everything in life it's subjective. One man's meat etc... Jazz/blues is the basis for all modern music and, probably, although I'm in left field on this one. contemporary classical music. Or to sum up. all music is influenced by all music. To digress, I wonder, when Joshua fought the battle of Jericho and the walls came tumbling down, who was playing lead trumpet?

Steve T said...

Possibly should have used the capital M but on a Jazz site, I prefer to save it for Jazz. Like modern Jazz is the forties, modern soul the seventies, modern classical music is early twentieth century (contemporaneous to modern art)and is hugely important for Jazz and experimental rock.
I prefer to think of it as discursive rather than subjective (taste and opinion become excuses for anything and everything) based on bodies of knowledge constructed in power, nowadays generally in the hands of the media.
Currently we're subject to the discourse of Kind of Blue being one of the 'great' albums, talked about in the same breath as albums by people like the Beatles (who by their own admission, didn't make albums), Beach Boys, Bob Dylan, Bowie, Clash, Nirvana etc.
My background is in black music and this stuff is all a complete joke (maybe not Dylan but he's monumentally over-rated). I was talking to somebody at the first Durham Jazz Festival who claimed to be into blues, and claimed that he didn't distinguish by colour, but was unable to come up with one artist he listens to who is black, even get out of jail free card Hendrix.

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