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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

Saturday, April 07, 2018

GIJF Day 1: Big Chris Barber Band - Sage Gateshead, April 6

(Review by Russell)
Jazz festivals introduce change, the new, the hip into crowded schedules with little time to stop for breath and reflect. Sage Gateshead’s amazing three-day Gateshead International Jazz Festival is at the forefront in developing connections – particularly across Europe – and introducing the ‘new’. The opening night of this year’s GIJF exemplified this, yet, as many festival-goers made their way into Sage One, the largest performance space in the Norman Foster-designed Tyneside landmark, preparing to immerse themselves in a triple bill featuring the headlining Sun Ra Arkestra, and just across the way in the Northern Rock Foundation Hall significant numbers were keenly anticipating an evening of contemporary jazz piano, it was in Sage Two that one of the enduring figures in jazz attracted a standing-room-only crowd.

A ten-piece band playing ‘classic era’ jazz with lots of Duke Ellington, some might say such bands are ‘ten-a-penny’ and perhaps they are, but this band in the three-tiered Sage Two concert hall is, note present tense, one of the great bands. Chris Barber maintains a punishing schedule, touring across Europe returning to play a string of British dates then setting off again…Germany, Holland, the tour bus clocking up tens of thousands of miles, year in year out, filling concert halls wherever he goes. Bourbon Street Parade – what else? – set the ball rolling and from then on it was typical Barber. The legendary bumbling announcements have taken on epic proportions and reassuringly remain as incomprehensible as ever. The jazz is simply marvellous, the numbers coming thick and fast; Rent Party Blues, Jubilee Stomp, Goin’ Home, Barber’s enthusiastic commentary referencing Ellington, Clarence Williams, Ken Colyer (hurrah!), Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee.

The band – it’s important to get the words in the right order – is the Big Chris Barber Band and the nine, plus Barber, played straight through without an interval although Barber needed reminding of this at about the halfway point! From time to time two or three band members wandered off stage allowing a smaller combo to have a blow, variously the trumpets (Pete Rudeforth, Mike Henry), the hirsute Bob Hunt (trombone, arrangements and Barber’s right-hand man), the youthful Nick White, reeds, featured on alto playing a really modern piece titled All Blues (!), and the new face, Scot Ian Killoran, slotting into the reeds’ section, playing as if he’d been in the line-up for twenty years. Give him twenty years and he will have been in the band for that long (it’s the kind of thing Barber might say), and what’s the betting that C. Barber will still be at the helm?!

Wild Cat Blues, Black and Tan Fantasy, C Jam Blues, the Big Chris Barber Band was having fun – Bert Brandsma wielded a mean liquorice stick, the rhythm section purring, Barber was in there, all the more these days as a member of the band rather than leader of the band. It was Bob Hunt who kept the great man on track with a quiet word, a smile. Barber would have gone on ’til midnight but the younger members of the band didn’t have half his energy and it was getting past their bedtime. Sage Two’s audience rose to its feet to acclaim Chris Barber. He’ll be back, that’s for sure. 
Russell.    
Chris Barber (trombone, vocals); Bob Hunt (trombone, trumpet, arrangements); Mike Henry (trumpet, cornet); Pete Rudeforth (trumpet, vocals); Nick White (alto, soprano & baritone saxophones, clarinet); Ian Killoran (clarinet, tenor & bass saxophones); Bert Brandsma (clarinet, tenor & bass saxophones); Joe Farler (banjo, guitar); John Day (double bass); John Watson (drums).

                        

1 comment :

Patrick said...

At the age of 87 Chris Barber's energy is still there - and his sense of humour hasn't deserted him either - referring to a classic rendition of Petite Fleur by Nick White as "a medley of our hit" All in all, a superb evening's entertainment.

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