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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

Friday, July 14, 2017

Benny Benack III - A guy worth checking out.

(After reading this press release of Benny Benack III, I was curious to discover more - and I'm pleased that I did. Singing or blowing trumpet this young man proves that all of the young talents don't come out of Newcastle. Some even come from across the pond in New York. Check him out here. - Lance.)
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(Press release)
Benny Benack III, a young and multi-talented Pittsburgh native and denizen of the New York jazz scene. He is never one to limit himself. He is both an affable and expressive jazz singer and a formidable, modern-minded trumpeter, and these elements of his musical self are deeply and effortlessly intertwined. On One of a Kind, his debut release, Benack also reveals himself to be a wry and expressive songwriter and lyricist, bringing his boundless musical gifts together in a program that’s steeped in tradition but every bit as restlessly individual as his album title suggests.
Benack teams with two players he calls his “musical brothers,” pianist Emmet Cohen and bassist Alex Claffy, as well as a key mentor, drummer Ulysses Owens, Jr. “Ulysses was really the first musician that took me under his wing and gave me a shot and brought me on the road,” Benack says. “To have him here on my first album means the world.” Saxophonist Joel Frahm and guitarist Yotam Silberstein, masters on their respective instruments, make vital contributions as well.
Presenting eight Benack originals (four vocal, four instrumental), one by Emmet Cohen, vibrant covers of Burt Bacharach and Harry Warren/Al Dubin classics, and a closing killer novelty song by Eddie Jefferson, Benack paints a self-portrait in sound, honoring a legacy that stretches back to Benny Benack, Sr., his trumpeter/bandleader grandfather. Having grown up playing gigs with his father Benny, Jr., and absorbing influences from his musical theater vocalist mother Claudia, Benny III became the kind of player, writer and interpreter we hear today on One of a Kind: “I gravitated first to the legends of Tin Pan Alley. I find myself identifying not only with their timeless harmonic and melodic sensibilities but also the whimsical charms of their musings on romance and melancholy. I would love for my songs to capture the essence of that magical Golden Era.”
Benack continues: “The lyric aspect of my composing didn’t develop until much later. As I became more comfortable with my voice maturing into a focal point, it was only natural that I would gain inspiration to write from my personal experiences. For that to occur I needed a certain amount of romance and heartbreak, along with successes and setbacks. When those came to be, I found the music and words flowing out of me faster than I could write them down.”

The history of singing trumpeters goes back of course to the very foundation of jazz, which is Louis Armstrong. It goes forward to encompass Roy Eldridge, Dizzy Gillespie, Clark Terry, Chet Baker, Kenny Dorham and more. “Anyone who steps onstage and sings while holding a trumpet owes a debt to all of them,” says Benack. “Because the trumpet is such an intimately vocal instrument, I believe it attracts musicians who hold lyricism and humanity in the highest regard. While my singing style is more out of the classic crooner continuum of Sinatra, Tony Bennett and Harry Connick, Jr., I relate the most to people like Dizzy and Louis, who showed the world that virtuosity and artistry didn’t have to be packaged in a demure and ‘serious’ way, that it was perfectly OK to laugh and smile while playing on the highest level.”

That upbeat sentiment is there from the first bars of the robust mid-tempo swing opener and title track “One of a Kind.” It’s a song about youthful love and exuberance, says Benack, and as a vocal-and-trumpet number it’s “the perfect summation of who I am as an artist.” Then after the Jobim-inspired, guitar-driven “Kiss Me Slowly” comes the tightly orchestrated and drum-centric “I Found You,” followed by Cohen’s “You Already Know,” which the pianist wrote with Benack in mind “as a piece that would feature my strengths: fiery excitement, whirring harmony & spirited fun!”
Benack recalls “Looking for Love” as “the first ballad I ever wrote,” while the fiery hard-bop of “Jumpstart” is his “homage to the ‘Young Lion’ movement of the ’90s, when my contemporary trumpet heroes burst onto the scene. I tried to imagine Nicholas Payton or Roy Hargrove slicing through these chord changes, and I hope I did them justice.”

Silberstein returns on acoustic guitar in fine form for the romantic Latin instrumental “When Midnight Comes.” Benack plays flugelhorn, joined by Frahm on soprano, on the Ahmad Jamal-inspired “Londontowne,” while “Guh Guh Guh” (with Frahm on tenor) is a suitably frenetic set-closer featuring the full band. “The title comes from how I hear the song’s first three notes,” says Benack. “The pace builds and builds until the ending explodes like a comet in flight….”

The remarkable arrangements of “Close to You” and “I Only Have Eyes for You” are full of surprises and a fun, grooving vibe that evokes the best of the historical intermingling of jazz and pop. And “Benny’s from Heaven,” which Benack first heard James Moody sing at a jazz camp years ago, was destined to become an irreverent staple in his repertoire. “After Eddie Jefferson’s lyrics, I composed the vocalese myself with my own solo as a framework, trying to channel the powers of such a wordsmith.”
Throughout One of a Kind, on the horn and the mic, Benack brings it all together with stirring swing and a unity of aesthetic intent, in the spirit of his role models. “My ultimate aspiration,” he says, “is to have each side of my artistry complement the other, to give my voice and trumpet space to shine.” And shine they do.
For further information, visit: www.bennybenackjazz.com
CD release show:
September 21st, 2017 at Birdland Jazz Club in New York City
6pm performance/ Doors open at 5PM
Birdland Jazz Club
315 West 44th St.
New York, NY 10036

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