
When someone dies it is almost obligatory to say what a nice guy he was irrespective of the truth. No such subterfuge in the case of Fred Rowe. Fred really was one of the nicest guys you could hope to meet and a fine trumpet player who formed his style early on and stuck with it. I first heard him playing with the Rivermouth Jazzmen at the Wouldhave Café, later to change its name to the Shoreline Club, on the seafront at South Shields. It was honest, straight down the middle, Dixieland. This would be in the early '50s. In later years I heard Fred with the Tyne Valley Stompers and other bands led by drummer Ray Brown.