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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

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.
Sun 13: Jazz Jam @ Fabio’s, Saddler St., Durham. 8:00pm. Free. A DUJS event. All welcome.

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.

Sat 19: Jeff Hewer Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 19: Howlin’ Mat @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Country blues guitar & vocals. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

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, December 21, 2019

Paul Edis and Friends: A Jazzy Christmas @ Ushaw College – Dec. 20

(Review by Steve T/ Photos courtesy of Jerry E).

Tonight promised some changes from the set at Middlesbrough Town Hall the previous Sunday, presumably for us die-hards taking in more than one of the four shows this year.

The first came with the full ensemble on stage for the opening Winter Wonderland. Solos from trumpet, sax and violin; piano and guitar switching comping duties, as they would throughout the set; more exchanges between sax and violin during the extended fade.

All I Want for Christmas is You is a new one for this year, which doesn't feature on the accompanying album. Taken at a slower pace than Maria Carey's original brought out the blues, guitar taking a solo, violin cutting through above the horns. This is another Christmas song which seems to have gained some credibility recently - apparently it's currently no 1 in America - perhaps because she's a serious singer, and Paul rightly paid tribute to Jo - another seriously good singer.

Rocking Around the Christmas Tree was taken as a rhumba, before The Christmas Waltz, which, following an introduction from horns and violin, featured solos from soprano and piano, Paul's first and, in amongst everything else, it's easy to forget what a fine pianist he is.

From our vantage point I noticed the juxtaposition of the combination of horns: muted trumpet and flute, trombone and clarinet, all, trombone and trumpet, clarinet and flute.

I'll be Home for Christmas took it down to voice, piano, bass and drums and featured a lovely light-touch bass solo from the Champion.

Another new piece for this year, via Home Alone, is Carol of the Bells, a piccolo feature with another violin solo, both ladies acquitting themselves splendidly.

Paul and wife Kate's Christmas original followed, sang by Paul, and the number one spot will need to wait for another year; a beautiful, short piano solo followed by tenor unravelling for another appropriately concise solo.

The first set finished with the return of Jo Harrop for some throaty, sassy, sexy singing on Santa Baby, intermingled with Basie's Splanky.

Set two opened with my favourite track from the album (sorry Jo), an instrumental, sax led version of Chris Rea's Driving Home for Christmas. Paul noted he'd forgotten the previous week that Rea is a Boro native. I don't rate the chances of the original if this version ever gets out.

Jo was back for Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow, muted trumpet taking it back to New Orleans, solos from soprano and bass before a round of fours from the ever resourceful Russ Morgan.

What are you doing New Year’s Eve? took it down to voice and piano as the band scattered to the four corners of the theatre for Once in Royal David's City, led by piano, violin, flute, trombone, drums, bowed bass and sax.

New Year New You is another new song from Paul and Kate Edis - an expanded edition of the album next year perhaps - and is a twelve bar blues with solos from sax and guitar, followed by a singalong.

The Christmas Song, complete with chestnuts metaphorically roasting on an open fire, featured a lovely violin part before the final song Sleigh Ride lost the strings and slimmed the horns down to sax and trumpet for a race to the finish, stopping for a solo piano interlude which found our maestro in Scott Joplin territory.

Edis had hinted at an encore without all the fuss of leaving the stage and White Christmas - more a Christmas anthem than song - gave Jo a last chance to pull at our emotions, Emma adding some beautiful embellishments, sharing solos with clarinet, before finishing with a lovely final flourish.

I can only imagine this is going to grow and grow. 
Steve T          

Paul Edis (piano/vocal); Jo Harrop (vocal); Emma Fisk (violin); Matt Anderson (tenor/soprano saxes); Graham Hardy (trumpet/flugelhorn); Jason Holcomb (trombone); Megan Robinson (flute/piccolo); Faye Thompson (alto sax/clarinet); Francis Tulip (guitar); Andy Champion (bass); Russ Morgan (drums).

3 comments :

Steve T said...

Watching it again at the Sage tonight (and I've no doubt Russell will be reviewing it), as the band dispersed around the three levels, I thought I'd put the wrong choon in my review of Ushaw, until Paul explained there were six carols going on, depending on where you were in the theatre. Genius.

JERRY said...

At Ushaw we were two seats away from Faye on clarinet and we got The Sussex Carol. Proper title for all was A Congregation of Carols. Pun intended, surely?

Lance said...

At Sage Gateshead we got Emma and Hark the Herald Angels Sing. That's three down and three to go!

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