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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

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: Lindsay Hannon + Eleanor Adams @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A 'Jar on the Bar' gig. Note, this is a change to the previously advertised gig.
Sun 13: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.
Sun 13: Jazz Jam @ Fabio’s, Saddler St., Durham. 8:00pm. Free. A DUJS event. All welcome.

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.

Sat 19: Sat 19: Paula Jackman’s Jazz Masters @ St Augustine’s Parish Centre, Darlington. 12:30pm. Darlington New Orleans Jazz Club.
Jeff Hewer Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 19: Howlin’ Mat @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Country blues guitar & vocals. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

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, August 11, 2017

Zoe Gilby & Andy Champion @ The Jazz Cafe - August 4

Zoe Gilby (vocals) & Andy Champion (double bass).
(Review by JC/Photos  from archives courtesy of Mike Tilley .)
I very rarely come into the centre of Newcastle at weekends except to go to a jazz gig, usually at the Jazz Cafe, as it is often a slightly alarming experience. In the old days jazz used be wild music associated with illicit substances and unbridled sexual licence and decent law abiding citizens would not be associated with it. Now it's the other way round with the Jazz Cafe being a haven of tranquillity and sensible shoes with the drugs and sex mostly just in the songs, while outside in the city centre the streets around are like something out of one of Fellini's films. Noisy gangs of young men and equally voluble groups of young women fill the pavements and the roads. No children or families, of course, or anyone over 30 - except for a solitary jazz fan in appropriate footwear heading swiftly for Pink Lane.
However, that doesn't mean that the music in the Cafe is not edgy and passionate - it is - and the Gilby-Champion duo were in great form. I've always been a big fan of this duo format because of the instinctive interplay between the two performers and the opportunity it gives Zoe Gilby to display her vocal improvisational skills and subtle lyrical interpretations of well-chosen songs and Andy Champion to foreground all the possibilities of his double bass.
I arrived a little after the first set began and the duo were well into Nice Work If You Can Get It. with Andy Champion in full flow on his bass solo. As I was enjoying the music I wasn't really keeping a list of the order of the songs but some of the ones that stood out were the Monk tunes, Straight, No Chaser, imbibed at a breakneck pace and Well, You Needn't sung with all the sharp, staccato twists and turns of Monk's piano-playing.
As well as including classic jazz songs, their repertoire has always been diverse and quirky picking out tracks that have something special about them by modern songwriters - Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, Pink Floyd and more. Tonight it was particularly sinister versions of Nick Cave's Red Right Hand and Tom Waits Way Down in the Hole with the close interplay of voice and bass creating an edgy atmosphere. Maybe a disguised Donald Trump was in the audience as he pinched a quote from the Waits' song in his threats to North Korea a few days later 'He's got the fire and fury/at his command'. Kate Bush's mysterious Kashka from Baghdad, who seems to be having a good time behind closed doors, got the full range of Gilby's vocal ability and a beautiful rendition of Weaver of Dreams changed the pace. The duo's set included two new additions to the repertoire, both connected to the great but enigmatic singer, Nick Drake, who died at the early age of 26. The first was John Martyn's Solid Air, a song written for Drake, which seems to capture his troubled life. They finished with Drake's own Riverman and both Gilby and Champion gave it an intense treatment with Gilby really drawing out the emotion of the lyrics. This rounded off a fantastic gig with both performers demonstrating their dexterous versatility with a great selection of songs, changing tempo and tone, improvising and embellishing at will. All those lucky people who have tickets for their performance at Ilkley Jazz Festival are in for a treat!
Then it was  back out onto the streets, the whole scene looking even more surreal than before. A group of women emerged from a bar wearing pink bunny ears and one was carrying a life-size inflatable doll - was that her prize or her punishment? I went quickly on....
JC

1 comment :

Pam Young (on F/b) said...

Fabulous gig by two top drawer musicians wonderful material

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