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Bebop Spoken There

Steve Coleman: ''If you don't keep learning, your mind slows down. Use it or lose it''. (DownBeat, January 2025).

The Things They Say!

This is a good opportunity to say thanks to BSH for their support of the jazz scene in the North East (and beyond) - it's no exaggeration to say that if it wasn't for them many, many fine musicians, bands and projects across a huge cross section of jazz wouldn't be getting reviewed at all, because we're in the "desolate"(!) North. (M & SSBB on F/book 23/12/24)

Postage

17733 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 17 years ago. 53 of them this year alone and, so far, 53 this month (Jan. 20).

From This Moment On ...

January 2025

Sat 25: Boys of Brass @ St James’ STACK, Newcastle. 3:30-5:30pm. Free.
Sat 25: New '58 Jazz Collective @ Jackson's Wharf, Hartlepool. 6:30pm (doors). Free. A Burns' Night event. Jazz, swing, funk, soul, blues etc.
Sat 25: Edison Herbert Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 25: Red Kites Jazz @ Parish Hall, St Barnabas’ Church, Rowlands Gill. 7:30pm. £10.00. BYOB (tea & coffee available), raffle. Proceeds to St Barnabas’ Church. Performance feat. Shayo (vocals).
Sat 25: Jack & Jay’s Songbook @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sun 26: Musicians Unlimited @ Jackson’s Wharf, Hartlepool. 1:00pm. Free.
Sun 26: Graham Hardy Eclectic Quartet @ Queen’s Hall, Hexham. 3:00pm.
Sun 26: Ruth Lambert Trio @ The Juke Shed, Union Quay, North Shields. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 26: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 26: Jazz Jam Sandwich! @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sun 26: Tweed River Jazz Band @ Barrels Ale House, Berwick-upon-Tweed. 7:30pm. Free.
Sun 26: Gratkowski, Tramontana, Beresford, Affifi @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm. £12.00. JNE.
Sun 26: Jazz Jam @ Fabio’s, Saddler St., Durham. 8:00pm. Free. A Durham University Jazz Society promotion. All welcome.

Mon 27: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 27: Michael Young Trio @ The Engine Room, Sunderland. 6:30pm. Free.

Tue 28: ???

Wed 29: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 29: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.
Wed 29: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).

Thu 30: Matters Unknown (aka Jonathan Enser, Nubiyan Twist) + support TBA @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 8:00pm (7:00pm doors). £12.22 (gig & food); £9:04 (gig only).
Thu 30: Soznak @ The Mill Tavern, Hebburn. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 30: Struggle Buggy @ Harbour View, Roker, Sunderland. 8:00pm. Free. Rhythm & blues.

Fri 31: Alan Barnes Quartet @ The Old Library, Auckland Castle, Bishop Auckland. 12 noon-2:00pm (two sets). £12.00. admission (card or cash at the door). Barnes (alto sax, baritone sax, clarinet); Alan Law (piano); Mick Shoulder (double bass); Tim Johnston (drums). Note change of venue, no longer at Mrs M’s as advertised, the concert will be in the Old Library (Bishop Auckland Jazz’s regular venue). Important! It’s a ‘BYOB’ arrangement - ie bring your own booze (and/or tea, coffee, soft drinks).
Fri 31: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 31: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 31: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 31: Café Orkestar @ Café Under the Spire, Gateshead. 6:00pm. ‘Klezmer, Gypsy Jazz, Balkan & More!’.
Fri 31: Nothing in Rambling @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £10.00. + bf. Country blues duo.
Fri 31 Zoë Gilby Quartet @ Wylam Institute. 7:30pm (7:00pm doors). £15.00. + £1.50. bf.
Fri 31: Creakin’ Bones & the Sunday Dinners @ White Room, Stanley. 7:45pm. £10.00 + bf. Jazz, blues , jump jive, rock ‘n’ roll.
Fri 31: Alan Barnes Quartet @ The Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. £15.00 Barnes (alto sax, baritone sax, clarinet); Alan Law (piano); Mick Shoulder (double bass); Tim Johnston (drums).
Fri 31: SwanNek + Rivkala @ Pilgrim, Newcastle. 8:00pm. SwanNek’s new single launch gig. Pilgrim, formerly Hoochie Coochie.

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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