Total Pageviews

Bebop Spoken There

Wendell Brunious: "Because the blues is not 1,4 and 5 or 1,4,5,2,1. You could wake up with a flat tyre or a headache this morning, that's the blues, man" - (DownBeat, Oct. 2023).

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!"

Postage

15878 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 15 years ago. 885 of them this year alone and, so far, 83 this month (Sept. 30).

From This Moment On ...

October

Tue 03: Paul Skerritt @ The Rabbit Hole, Hallgarth St., Durham DH1 3AT. 7:00pm. Paul Skerritt's (solo) weekly residency.
Tue 03: Jam session @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. House trio: Michael Young (piano); Paul Grainger (double bass); Sid White (drums). CANCELLED!

Wed 04: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Wed 04: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 04: Paul Skerritt @ Vespa Italian Bar & Steakhouse, Primrose Hill, Jarrow. From 7:00pm. To book a table - 0191 483 3355.
Wed 04: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm.

Thu 05: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 05: Sound the Trumpets @ King's Hall, Newcastle University. 1:15pm. Free.
Thu 05: Hot Club du Nord @ The Lubetkin Theatre, Peterlee. 7:00pm. £10.00. POSTPONED!
Thu 05: Thursday Night Prayer Meeting @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm.
Thu 05: Tommy Bentz Trio + Mark Croft Duo + George Shovlin & George Lamb @ The Harbour View, Sunderland. 8:00pm. Free. Harbour View Speakeasy's USA blues double bill + Shovlin & Lamb!
Thu 05: Merlin Roxby @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Ragtime piano. A 'Jar on the Bar' gig.
Thu 05: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman's Club, Middlesbrough. 9:00pm.

Fri 06: Alcyona Mick @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 1:00pm. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Fri 06: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Fri 06: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 06: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms, Monkseaton. 1:00pm.
Fri 06: WORKSHOP: Philosophy of Arts & Entertainment @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 2:00pm. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Fri 06: Balo @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 6:20pm. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Fri 06: Paul Skerritt @ 3Sixty Champagne Lounge, Hadrian’s Tower, Newcastle. From 7:00pm. To book a table - 0191 933 8591.
Fri 06: Lexer/Mayes/Noble + Semay Wu + Miman @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 7:20pm. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Fri 06: Dulcie May Moreno @ The Vault, Hexham. 7:30pm. £20.00. Book in advance. Moreno with Alan Law, Paul Grainger & John Bradford.
Fri 06: Dean Stockdale Quartet @ Saltburn Community Hall. 7:30pm. 'Celebrating Oscar'.
Fri 06: Nu Brass Sounds: Big Brass Bash @ Billy Bootlegger’s, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free.
Fri 06: King Bees @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Blind Pig Blues Club. A 'Jar on the Bar' gig.

Sat 07: WORKSHOP: Philosophy of Arts & Entertainment @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 10:15am. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Sat 07: Hot Club du Nord @ St Augustine's Parish Centre, Darlington. 12:30pm.
Sat 07: Bugge & Niccols + Moore & Fairhall @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 1:00pm. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Sat 07: Play Jazz! workshop @ The Globe, Newcastle. 1:30pm. Tutor: Steve Glendinning - All the Things You Are. £25.00. Enrol at: www.jazz.coop.
Sat 07: Abbie Finn Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 6:00pm. Free.
Sat 07: Rie Nakajima @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 6:20pm. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Sat 07: Paul Skerritt @ 3Sixty Champagne Lounge, Hadrian’s Tower, Newcastle. From 7:00pm. To book a table - 0191 933 8591.
Sat 07: Samuel Blaser Trio + Toxvaerd & Zeeberg + Muramatsu & Welch @ Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 7:20pm. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Sat 07: Anth Purdy @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm.
Sat 07: Rendezvous Jazz @ Red Lion, Earsdon. 8:00pm. £3.00.

Sun 08: Zoë Gilby Quintet + Ubunye @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Line-up inc. Tony Kofi. A Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music event.
Sun 08: Tommy Bentz Band @ Tyne Bar, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. USA blues band.

Mon 09: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Mon 09: Cherise Adams-Burnett @ The Grove, Byker, Newcastle. 7:30pm. .

Tue 10: Abbie Finn Trio @ Forum Music Centre, Darlington. 7:30pm.

Monday, January 15, 2018

Francis Tulip Quartet @ The Quakerhouse, Darlington - Jan 14

Francis Tulip (guitar), Joel Brown (keyboards), Michael Dunlop (bass) & Matthew MacKellar (drums) + Dan Garel (alto saxophone)
(Review by Russell).
Darlington Jazz Club’s first concert promotion of the year featured a young quartet playing a fourth and final date of a tour across Northumberland, Tyne and Wear, and here at the Quakerhouse pub in County Durham. The Francis Tulip Quartet was about to go into abeyance as the musicians set off on their travels once again to Birmingham, London, Boston, USA and downtown Whitley Bay.
The Quakerhouse was as full as it gets for this eagerly anticipated appearance by the new kids on the block and the audience wasn’t to be disappointed. Benny Golson’s Stablemates, guitarist Gilad Hekselman’s Purim, a familiar looking setlist, the quartet, with bassist Michael Dunlop travelling up from London to play the gig, was in the groove from the off. And as if it couldn’t get any better, Dan Garel would join the band to play a couple of numbers!
Alto saxophonist Dan, in his final year of study at Durham University, is a stand out musician on the local scene (Group Theory, Durham University Big Band, Empty Shop jam session organiser and a frequent participant at the Jazz Café’s jam session in Newcastle), and his presence made this an ‘I was there’ occasion. And they played two all-time great standards - Body and Soul and Stella by Starlight. If they’d packed up there and then it would have been worth making the trip.

Francis Tulip sustained remarkably mature guitar playing throughout the two sets and another term at Birmingham Conservatoire will, likely as not, produce further wonders. As bandleader, Tulip took responsibility for making the usual announcements, and the quartet closed the first set with all four musicians contributing blazing solos on Caravan segueing into 500 Miles High.

As the second set was about to start pianist Joel Brown and bassist Michael Dunlop were nowhere to be seen. Francis Tulip filled the void playing a few bars of All the Things You Are. Cue applause. As Brown and Dunlop returned to the stand Matt MacKellar counted in Yes or No. Wayne Shorter’s number has featured on all tour dates yielding brilliant individual and group musicianship and here at the Quakerhouse it wasn’t any different. Other bands with more miles on the clock would be only too proud to match this standard. More from New York guitar wiz Gilad Hekselman as Tulip and co played March of the Sad Ones. The lads would appear to like playing the number, and why not?

Black Narcissus produced sensitive playing all round, In Walked Bud took a funk turn with Michael Dunlop’s five-string bass playing confirming a real talent as drummer Matt MacKellar had some fun on an exchange of fours. On his recent flight home from Boston Matt whiled away time transcribing Christian McBride’s Interlude for the band. Time well spent! Some seriously good playing by all four. The Francis Tulip Quartet’s now familiar finale – John Coltrane’s Impressions – featured the return of Dan Garel on alto as Dunlop and Brown struck up a most musical bass and piano conversation before bandleader Tulip assumed command taking it out. The applause said it all.    
Russell.    

                         

No comments :

Blog Archive