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Bebop Spoken There

Kurt Elling: ''There's something to learn from every musician you play with''. (DownBeat, December 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

17630 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 904 of them this year alone and, so far, 49 this month (Dec. 20).

From This Moment On ...

December

Fri 20: Edison Herbert Trio @ The Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 1:00pm. SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 20: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 20: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 20: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 1:00-3:00pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Fri 20: Baghdaddies @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm. SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Smokin’ Spitfires @ Platform 1, East Bedlington Community Centre. 7:00pm.
Fri 20: Pete Tanton’s Christmas @ 1719, Hendon, Sunderland. 7:30pm. CANCELLED!
Fri 20: Alligator Gumbo @ Saltburn Community Hall. 7:30pm. SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Abbie Finn’s Finntet @ The Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. Opus 4 Jazz Club.
Fri 20: Brass Fiesta @ Revoluçion de Cuba, Newcastle. 10:30pm. Free.

Sat 21: Lindsay Hannon Quartet @ Central Bar, Gateshead. 2:00pm. £15.00. ‘Swinging with Christmas Songs’.
Sat 21: Jason Isaacs @ Seaburn STACK, Seaburn. 3:30-5:30pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Sat 21: Jackson’s Wharf Xmas Party @ Jackson’s Wharf, Hartlepool. 7:00pm. Free. Featuring the New ’58 Jazz Collective.
Sat 21: Brass Fiesta @ Revoluçion de Cuba, Newcastle. 10:30pm. Free.

Sun 22: Hot Club du Nord @ The Globe, Newcastle. 1:00pm. £15.00. + bf. Xmas party. SOLD OUT!
Sun 22: Red Kites Jazz @ Gibside Chapel, nr. Rowlands Gill. 1:00pm. Admission charge applies.
Sun 22: Paul Skerritt @ Hibou Blanc, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free. Vocalist Skerritt working with backing tapes.
Sun 22: Ruth Lambert Trio @ The Juke Shed, Union Quay, North Shields. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: Revolutionaires @ Tyne Bar, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. Superb rhythm & blues outfit.
Sun 22: Laurence Harrison, Paul Grainger & Mark Robertson @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Line-up TBC.
Sun 22: The Globe Xmas Party @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:00pm. Free. Live music (musicians TBC).
Sun 22: Ray Stubbs R & B All-Stars @ Zerox, Sandhill, Newcastle. 7:00pm (doors).

Mon 23: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Wheatsheaf, Benton Sq., Whitley Road, Palmersville NE12 9SU. Tel: 0191 266 8137. 1:00pm. Free. CANCELLED!
Mon 23: Edison Herbert Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 4:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 4:00-6:00pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Mon 23: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.

Tue 24: Lindsay Hannon & Mark Williams @ Ernest, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 11:00am-1:00pm. Free.
Tue 24: Paul Skerritt @ Mambo Wine & Dine, South Shields. 1:00pm. Free. Vocalist Skerritt working with backing tapes.

Wed 25: Wot? No jazz!

Thu 26: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free. TBC.
Thu 26: The Boneshakers @ Tyne Bar, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. The 17th annual Boneshakers’ Shindig.

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, May 11, 2019

Cheltenham Jazz Festival: Swing Out Sister @ Town Hall – May 5.

(Review by Steve T)

When I first met the future Mrs T, Corrine Drewery had the second best bob in the world. Both bobs would disappear in time but the Swing Out Sister's would return and she'd get the best bob in the world, at the age of Alan Barnes. They're one of the groups we both liked, though unlike Fleetwood Mac, Genesis, Earth Wind and Fire, Roxy Music and Level 42, we actually like much the same lineup and records.

Doing lots of live jazz in recent years, I realised I missed the big popstar entrance: the fifteen-minute delay, the background music and lights on the stage, the band arrive, then the number one sister. Number two sister on vocals and percussion, a drummer, bass, guitar, trumpet and reeds and the other permanent member, with whom she writes the bulk of the songs, Andy Connell on keyboards.

I always thought the chairs should come out for this one but it was no surprise to find us on the very back row. Last year I paid for priority booking and rang at - by their admission - precisely the moment the tickets went on sale, but ended up with worse tickets than this, due to 'technical' issues at their end and was told priority booking was a lottery, so tough. As it happened this allowed us to enjoy ourselves without the glares of the majority and our corner became a magnet for like-minded people, though some tried to incite others to join in, which I didn't agree with.

I'd feared they may just do the new album and the choicest cuts from their back catalogue, but I'm reliably informed Don't Give the Game Away was the only one from the latest set. As at Sage 2 in Gateshead a few years back, they opened with their other hit Surrender and went through many of their best-loved songs from the last thirty odd years, including You on My Mind and Not Gonna Change. Their version of Barbara Acklin's Am I the Same Girl? had the ladies in the audience swaying in their seats, though they didn't reference the title track from Donald Byrd's popular jazz-funk album Places and Spaces, as on their recent reworking of it.

She told us they started out as a pop group but then got jazzy, making them too jazzy for pop but not jazzy enough for jazz, though soul fans, at least in this country, seem to still have a fondness for them. Popular around the world, and particularly in Japan, I don't know when she last went to a jazz club in this country, as she beckoned us to get rowdy on the basis that it's jazz, though only our corner responded. 

We finally got our chance to charge forward when the place erupted to Breakout. I wondered whether they question why so many people had come to see them who only appear to know or like their big hit, or whether by then they were just so relieved to get a response beyond polite applause.

And that was the end of my 2019 Cheltenham adventure. I'd have preferred to catch Yazz Ahmed, who I've seen before, and Joshua Redman, who I haven't, but was left wondering why the soul community hadn't landed on the town. Incognito did Friday night and are very popular, for reasons I don't quite understand; the soul scene still seems to hold out some hope for Gregory Porter, who did Saturday night; Sanborn was a big deal in the jazz-funk scene, which most soul fans still think was the golden age of jazz; and Swing Out Sister; with lots more to explore in-between. Cheltenham wouldn't have known what had hit them. 
Steve T  

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