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Bebop Spoken There

Sullivan Fortner: ''I always judge it by the bass player: If the bass player is happy, it's going to be a good night". (DownBeat, February 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

17777 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 17 years ago. 98 of them this year alone and, so far, 23 this month (Feb.8).

From This Moment On ...

February 2025

Thu 13: Student Performances @ King’s Hall, Newcastle University. 4:00pm. Free. Inc. Olly Styles (tenor sax).
Thu 13: MOBO Awards Fringe 2025: Artist Showcase @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 7:00pm. Free (ticketed). Line-up inc. Hannabiell & Midnight Blue.
Thu 13: Indigo Jazz Voices @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:45pm. £5.00.

Fri 14: John Rowland Trio @ Jesmond Library, Newcastle. 1:00-2:00pm. £5.00. at the door. New second Friday in the month concert series.
Fri 14: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 14: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 14: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 14: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 4:00-6:00pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Fri 14: Archipelago + Anna Tempest @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £12.00., £10.00., £8.00.
Fri 14: Paul Jones & Dave Kelly @ Alnwick Playhouse. 7:30pm. Rhythm & blues.
Fri 14: Alexia Gardner Quintet @ The White Room, Stanley. 7:45pm.
Fri 14: Fiona Finden’s Jazz Express @ Flash House Brewing Co., North Shields. 8:00pm.
Fri 14: Jazz Sabbath @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 8:00pm.

Sat 15: Joseph Carville Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 15: James Birkett & Emma Fisk @ Yamaha Music School, Blyth. 7:30pm. £15.00. at the door; £14.35. (inc £0.35 bf) online, in advance.
Sat 15: Elkie Brooks @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 7:30pm. ‘The Long Farewell Tour’.
Sat 15: Milne Glendinning Band @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sun 16: MOBO Song @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 12 noon. Free, performances on the concourse. Line-up inc. Jazz Attack (on stage time TBC) & Jambone (12:20pm).
Sun 16: Paul Skerritt @ Hibou Blanc, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free. Vocalist Skerritt working with backing tapes.
Sun 16: Jason Isaacs @ STACK, Exchange Sq., Middlesbrough. 1:00-2:45pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Sun 16: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 16: MOBO Awards Fringe 2025: BBC Introducing NE X MOBO Showcase @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 6:00pm. Free (ticketed). Line-up inc. Jambone, Knats, Rivkala, SwanNek.
Sun 16: The Shayo Experience @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sun 16: Gerry Richardson Quartet @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm. .

Mon 17: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 17: Matt Forster Quartet @ Yamaha Music School, Blyth. 1:00pm. £9.00. at the door; £8.20. (inc £0.20 bf) online, in advance.
Mon 17: Russ Morgan Quartet @ The Black Bull, Blaydon. 8:00pm. £10.00.

Tue 18: Jam session @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free. House trio: Alan Law, Paul Grainger, John Hirst.

Wed 19: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 19: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 19: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. 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

Monday, March 23, 2020

The Cellar Boys + Miss Jubilee & Her Yas Yas Boys + Andy Schumm's Adhocs + The Chicago Swell Sisters + Dani Webber @ Bix Fest, Racine, Wisconsin - March 14

(Review by Russell)

The rumours were, in part, of some substance with the Shake 'Em Up Jazz Band choosing to stay home. The fabulous, all-female band from New Orleans continues to be a big hit at festivals all over the world including recent acclaimed appearances at Durham Brass and  Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival. Fortunately, St Louis' Miss Jubilee & Her Yas Yas Boys made the five and a half hours' road trip to Racine which would, by happenstance, result in a marvellous, unscheduled solo set on Sunday morning by the band's pianist Ethan Leinwand. 


Bix Fest's ballroom filled up with fans from all parts of America and further afield eschewing suggestions of the imminent end to the world as we knew it. In the absence of Marla Dixon and the Shake 'Em Ups the evening began with a performance by an adhoc group led by Andy Schumm - let's call 'em Andy Schumm's Adhocs. Ted Lewis recorded June Night in 1924 and, as Schumm said, it was a pop song of the day. Perhaps an unseasonal choice but nevertheless a good one to set us on our way. The Coon-Sanders Nighthawks recorded Sweepin' the Clouds Away in 1930. Schumm knows all about these guys as does pianist David Boeddinghaus (a Crescent City resident who chose to make the journey up into Illinois) who ambled onto the stage to play the Bix Fest upright.

The Chicago Swell Sisters vocal trio, accompanied by pianist Paul Asaro, entertained for an all-too-brief period and at intervals during the evening tap dancer Dani Webber stepped up to and on to her tap board which went down a storm.   

There are banjo players and there are virtuoso banjo players. By common consent of his peers, Jimmy Barrett is firmly in the latter category. A Chicagoan - at a glance you could be forgiven for thinking he'd just finished a twelve hour shift working as a stevedore down on the docks! - Barrett is the business. Mean, no nonsense, bluesy, brilliant and the guy will sing the occasional number as he did on Kansas City Kitty. It's long odds Mr Barrett will ever make it over this side of Atlantic but, if he does, don't miss him!

Miss Jubilee & Her Yas Yas Boys work out of St Louis, Missouri. A couple of years ago at the 'other' Bix Fest (the one in Davenport, Iowa) Miss Jubilee and, at the time, her 'Humdingers' wowed the crowd and a booking for Racine was all but assured. And, sure enough, here they were! Miss Jubilee (aka Valerie Kirchhoff) likes to promote the music of the many excellent, yet low profile, female artists of the era (1920s-30s) which she is (re)discovering, exploring and now performing a selection of their material some one hundred years on.   

Victoria Spivey's Moaning the Blues opened the show and what a show it would prove to be! A trumpet-clarinet frontline, a brilliant barrelhouse pianist, string bass and washboard - these were Miss Jubilee's 'Yas Yas Boys'. As Miss Jubilee shimmied and shimmied some more Ken Cebrian's muted and open horn blasts were the stuff of (Buddy Bolden) dreams. Readers from BSH's Tyneside heartland will know only too well the superb House of the Black Gardenia. St Louis has its own version in Miss Jubilee with her Yas Yas Boys. HotBG's frontwoman, the fabulous Bobbi Charleston, does it her way, cool, detached whereas Miss Jubilee is more the mover, constantly digging Cebrian and Rylan Calloway (clarinet) to her left and, to her right, Ethan Leinwand pounding the 88s. Baby, Don't You Tear My Clothes (sounds familiar? - it should, it's the HotBG!), Lil Johnson's That Bonus Done Gone Thru, Stump Johnson's The Duck - Yas-Yas-Yas and many more, Miss Jubilee scored a hit here in Racine. These guys would go down a storm on the Jumpin' Hot Club outdoor stage at Sage Gateshead's Summertyne Americana.         

Miss Jubilee & Her Yas Yas Boys: Miss Jubilee (vocals); Ethan Leinwand (piano); Ken Cebrian (trumpet); Rylan Calloway (clarinet); Richard Tralles (double bass); Ryan Koenig (washboard)   

The format at Bix Fest makes light of billing. It just so happened that Saturday's schedule placed Chicago's Cellar Boys as the nominal top-of-the-bill band - ie they were last on. London has its pecking order, likewise Tyneside, anywhere for that matter, and its no different in the Windy City. The 'first team' as it were, including recent recruit Natalie Scharf, made the trip north in the company of singer Roya Naldi. A couple from Clarence Williams (Charleston Hound and a three-clarinet Gulf Coast Blues), Walter Donaldson and Gus Kahn's He's the Last Word and Yes, Sir, That's My Baby (transcribed by Paul Asaro), the latter featuring vocalist Roya Naldi (Ms Naldi will be performing at this year's Classic Jazz Party at the Village Hotel on North Tyneside (Oct 30 - Nov 2), a stately Limehouse Blues and an original tune by Andy Schumm (Andy's Idea) were but some of many numbers across two tremendous sets which ended with the hottest of hot Fletcher Henderson charts - The Stampede - with the frontline of Schumm, Otto and Scharf blowing like crazy as Dave Bock's sousaphone pumped up the volume riding on John Donatowicz's piston-like rhythm guitar.   
       
The Cellar Boys: Andy Schumm (arranger, cornet, clarinet); Dave Bock (sousaphone); John Otto (alto sax, clarinet); Natalie Scharf (tenor sax, clarinet); John Donatowicz (guitar, banjo); Paul Asaro (piano, vocals); Roya Naldi (vocals) 

It had been quite some session. A late night jam session was due to get under way and, what's more, Sunday's session was still to come!  
Russell

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