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Bebop Spoken There

Ambrose Akinmusire: “ I am certainly always aware of what the masses are doing. And when I see too many people going one way, I'm going another way - even when I don't know what's over that way". DownBeat, March, 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

16287 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 169 of them this year alone and, so far, 41 this month (Mar 18).

From This Moment On ...

March

Tue 19: Jam session @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free. House trio: Michael Young, Paul Grainger, Tim Johnston.

Wed 20: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 20: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 20: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.

Thu 21: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 21: Castillo Neuvo Trio + Conor Emery & His ‘Bones Band @ The Grove, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 7:30pm (7:00pm doors). £10.00. (£7.00. student).
Thu 21: Remi Banklyn + Chris Corcoran Trio @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm. £12.50. Chicago blues. An International Guitar Foundation promotion.
Thu 21: Merlin Roxby @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Ragtime piano.
Thu 21: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman’s Club, Middlesbrough. 8:30pm.

Fri 22: Vasilis Xenopoulos & Paul Edis @ The Gala, Durham. 1:00pm. £8.00. SOLD OUT!
Fri 22: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 22: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 22: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 22: Nauta + Remy CB + Last Orders @ Hoochie Coochie, Newcastle. 8:30pm (7:30pm doors). Free.
Fri 22: Vasilis Xenopoulos-Paul Edis Quartet @ Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. £15.00. Opus 4 Jazz Club.
Fri 22: Redwell @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sat 23: Jambone @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 6:30pm. Free (ticketed). End of term performance in the Northern Rock Foundation Hall.
Sat 23: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 23: Red Kites Jazz @ Rowlands Gill Community Centre NE39 1JB. 7:00pm. Tickets: £12.00. (gibsidecommunityfarm@gmail.com). A ‘Build a Barn’ fundraiser. BYOB, tea/coffee available.
Sat 23: New Century Ragtime Orchestra @ Gosforth Civic Theatre, Newcastle. 7:30pm. £20.00. + bf (book in person at venue - no booking fee!). Featuring pianist Martin Litton.
Sat 23: Pete Tanton’s Cuba Libre @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sun 24: Musicians Unlimited @ Park Inn, Hartlepool. 1:00pm. Free.
Sun 24: More Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:30pm. Free.
Sun 24: Luis Verde @ Queen’s Hall, Hexham. 3:00pm. Verde (alto sax); Joe Steels (guitar); John Pope (double bass); John Hirst (drums). Alto sax brilliance!
Sun 24: Elsie Franklin @ The Globe, Newcastle. 3:00pm. £10.00. Country blues. An International Guitar Foundation promotion.
Sun 24: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay Metro Station. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 24: Las Vegas Live with the Rat Pack @ The Forum, Billingham.
Sun 24: Ian Millar & Dominic Spencer @ Otterburn Memorial Hall. 7:30pm. £12.00.
Sun 24: Lindsay Hannon: Tom Waits for No Man @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Note start time - 7:00pm.
Sun 24: Bold Big Band @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.

Mon 25: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 25: Michael Young Trio @ The Engine Room, Sunderland. 6:30pm. Free.

Monday, April 29, 2019

Preview: Darlington Jazz Festival (May 3-5)


(Preview by Russell)

This year's Darlington Jazz Festival, the eighth, promises to be the best yet. Established venues will continue to play host to top-flight jazz and a new initiative will see major concert performances presented in a town centre marquee. And, for night owls, there will be a late night jam session. From parish centre to church to cafe bar to ancient hostelry jazz will spill out onto the streets enticing the unsuspecting passer-by...Is this jazz? Yes, come on in!


Walk into the Voodoo Cafe on Friday evening (May 3) and you'll fall under the spell of the Matt Roberts Sextet playing the music of Blue Mitchell. Year after year Darlington-born trumpeter Roberts returns from his London home to present workshops, conduct ensembles and, here on Skinnergate, blow the roof off the joint! Down the years the affable Roberts has chalked-up some killer sessions featuring the music of (invariably Blue Note hard bop) trumpet legends including Nat Adderley, Lee Morgan and Fats Navarro. Year after year Roberts brings in an absolutely stonking sextet and this year it won't be any different. In recent times we've had to make do - make do! - with tenor players of the calibre of Leo Richardson and Riley Stone-Lonergan, this year, how about Josh Arcoleo? Oh, yes! Add the brilliant George Grant on alto, Sam Watts, piano, the fabulous Daisy George, double bass, and drummer Sam Gardener and you've got yourself the dream band. This Voodoo Cafe gig is always a sellout. If you want to be sure of getting in - the atmosphere is terrific - arrive by eight o'clock, buy a beer, queue on the stairs, eight quid in for a nine o'clock start. Unmissable!  

Saturday (May 4), blue skies (here's hoping!) and more jazz than you can shake a drum stick at. Noon, can you be in three places at once? Friend of Darlington Jazz Festival, Darlington New Orleans Jazz Club presents the New Century Ragtime Orchestra with not one, not two, but three special guests. Multi award-winning trumpeter Enrico Tomasso will join the NCRO along with period percussion virtuoso Nick Ward and Tyneside's star vocalist Ruth Lambert. Doors at twelve, £10 admission for a half past start. But wait! You'll need to be around the corner in Mechanics' Yard for a similarly early start to catch the Josh Arcoleo Quartet. It's free admission to the Quakerhouse session and following tenor man Arcoleo it's MGB (that's the Debra Milne - Steve Glendinning four piece) and after the Tynesiders' set it's playtime with Jamie TomsNot Now Charlie. Three bands for nowt (there will be a bucket collection), now that's a bargain! Oh, yes, the CAMRA recognised Quakerhouse keeps tip-top beers. And there's more free jazz - that's free admission as opposed to the genre - in Darlington town centre which will include the ever-popular Northern Monkey Brass Band, again, from midday. 
 
Saturday evening will be interesting. A new venture for Darlington Jazz Festival sees the first use of a marquee in the Market Square. At 7:00pm drummer Sebastiaan de Krom leads a starry quintet. Mere mention of the names should guarantee a full house - Martin Shaw, trumpet, Brandon Allen, sax, Gareth Williams, piano, and double bassist Steve Watts. £12 admission, recommended. And if you still want more there will be a late night jam session with a plethora of sitters-in (Dean Stockdale, piano) at the Pennyweight pub. Two pints of your finest and a packet of crisps, please!

Sunday (May 5). Come on, wake up! The Gypsy Jazz Brunch starts at ten! At Hush Bar on Coniscliffe Road, free admission - do buy a pastry - there will be a world-class start to the final day of this year's Darlington Jazz Festival. James Birkett and Emma Fisk of Eddie Lang-Joe Venuti fame will be partaking of a latte in between playing some six and four string 'classic era' jazz. As a bonus Strings Attached (the guitar and violin of Shaun Henderson and Gordon Dyke) will be brunching with James/Eddie and Emma/Joe.

Get me to the church - St Cuthbert's - on time...two o'clock prompt for a rare appearance by Triptych (Paul Edis, piano, Paul Susans, double bass, bass guitar, and Rob Walker, drums, percussion), and a special guest from London Aga Serugo-Lugo (clarinet, sax, vocals) together with a full-scale Darlington-based choir. £5 on the door. At six o'clock in the Market Square marquee Matt Roberts conducts County Durham's premier big band Durham Alumni Big Band in what promises to be a Darlington Jazz Festival concert finale with a difference. Think iconic 1980s tunes, TV themes - who knows what else?! - the DABB has been busy working on Roberts' wonderfully bizarre Born in the 1980s' charts. £12 admission, it should be fun!  

Darlington Jazz Festival in association with Darlington Food and Drink Festival, Creative Darlington, Durham Music Service, Musicians' Union, Arts Council England, Darlington Borough Council. For further details visit: www.darlingtonjazzfestival.co.uk      
Russell

5 comments :

Lance said...

Wow! It sounds like it's going to be a great weekend. However, for those staunch Tynesiders who think Darlo is 'doon sooth' then all is not lost. You can cut your journey by half and go to Durham where the ace of aces, Simon Spillett, will be wowing us with some of the greatest tenor playing either side of Tubby Hayes. Yes, Simon - who is to tenor playing what Billy the Kid was to gunslinging (and he has yet to meet up with a tenor-toting Pat Garrett who could out blow him) - plays two sessions on Friday in and around Durham. Friday lunchtime, catch him with Paul Edis at the Gala Theatre then, in the evening, long before sundown, Spillett and Edis are in quartet mode at Ushaw College. Both sessions are unmissable but, as the Gala is invariably sold out, Ushaw is the place for me!

Steve T said...

Not to mention the Cheltenham Jazz Festival, one of the biggest and worst organised in the country. As always, the listener must decide for themselves where the genuine quality ends and the naff stuff begins.
For me the big attractions are Swing Out Sister, Dave Sanborn, Joshua Redman, Soweto Kinch, Partisans, Sergio Mendes, Vula Viel, Yazz Ahmed, Bad Plus, Omar Sosa, Kandace Springs, John Surman, Abdullah Ibrahim, Incognito and Level 42, so I'm guessing a couple of surprises there.
Leading the naff end are Jamie Cullum, Gregory Porter, James Morrison, Katie Melua and Madeleine Peyroux.

Steve T said...

And not forgetting Ribble Valley Jazz Festival, featuring ace north east guitarist Mark Williams. I recall last year or the year before planning to do a festival crawl from Darlo to Ribble to Cheltenham but the long suffering, eternally skint Mrs T put a stop to it so we missed out Ribble.

Russell said...

Emma Fisk's six string partner at Sunday's jazz brunch session in Hash Bar on Coniscliffe Road will be Dave Harris not James Birkett.

Steve T said...

Another fine guitarist who knows his Gypsy Jazz.

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