DECEMBER 2025
Mon 22: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Tue 23: Paul Skerritt @ Chakh Dhoom, Jesmond, Newcastle. 7:00pm. Indian restaurant. Skerritt w. backing tapes.
Wed 24: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 24: Alexia Gardner @ The Townhouse, Bridge St., Morpeth. 1:30-4:30pm. ‘The A Capella Sessions’. Gardner, Paula Gardner, Alexia Hope Gardner Diamany.
Wed 24: Paul Skerritt @ Mambo Wine & Dine, South Shields. 1:30pm. Skerritt w. backing tapes.
Thu 25: Alexia Gardner @ The Townhouse, Bridge St., Morpeth. 1:30-4:00pm. ‘All About the Bass Sessions’. Alexia Gardner, Paula Gardner, Jude Murphy.
Fri 26: ???
Sat 27: Abbie Finn Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. CANCELLED!
Sat 27: Leeds City Stompers @ Billy Bootleggers, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 7:00pm. Free.
Sun 28: Paul Skerritt @ Hibou Blanc, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Skerritt w. backing tapes.
Sun 28: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 28: Paul Skerritt @ 3 Stories, High St. West, Sunderland. 6:30pm. Skerritt w. backing tapes.
Sun 28: The Society Quartet @ Hilton Garden Inn, Sunderland. 6:30pm. Jason Holcomb & co.
Mon 29: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Tue 30: Shalala @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm. £8.00., £7.00. adv.
Wed 31: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 31: Lil Miss Mary & the Mr Rights Trio @ Billy Bootlegger’s, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free. ‘Early NYE Bash’. Rockabilly, rhythm & blues.
Wed 31: Abbie Finn Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. ‘Midnight in Manhattan’ NYE party. £49.46 (inc. bf) & £29.38 (inc. bf).
18 comments :
Had tickets for Sonny Rollins but he cancelled and probably hasn't played since. SinAtra yes; Bird, Bud Powell and Max Roach obviously, and preferably all together (with Mingus and Diz, or Miles).
Presumably we're strictly on jazz:
Duke, Diz, Mingus, Miles (any time before his retirement), Sonny Rollins, Trane (I'd have been very young), Dolphy (very very young), Cannonball, Herbie (still time), Freddie Hubbard.
A bit obvious?
Well, I saw Trane and Dolphy together in 1961 so you may have to add or subtract a'very'!
Depends on the month Lance, though they say babies can hear music in the womb.
Wayne, Herbie, sonny rollins, Roy Hargrove, the Village people
According to Roddy Doyle's decidedly dodgy novel Hi Fidelity, men are obsessed with lists: of books, films, albums, artists, anything we can think of, preferably our top tens, so apologies ladies for being from the naff end of the species, but by all means feel free to join in.
I stumbled across this quite by chance and was initially flabbergasted, until I looked past the top ten and found it improved enormously just outside.
So here are the 14 greatest jazz artists, according to a random website, followed by my own choices.
Please note these are not necessarily my personal favourites but the ones I consider the greatest. The first four will remain constant from day to day though the order will change; the next five will remain constant but the order will vary, but the final five may vary, and not just the order.
Apologies ladies that it's all male but, had it been restricted to the last 10/ 20/ 30 years, it may have been different.
Unspecified Website:
Art Tatum
Buddy Rich
Joe Pass
Django Reinhardt
Lionel Hampton
Duke Ellington
Louis Armstrong
Ella Fitzgerald
Charlie Parker
Billie Holiday
Miles Davis
John Coltrane
Dizzy Gillespie
And my own:
Duke Ellington
Miles Davis
Charlie Parker
Louis Armstrong
John Coltrane
Dizzy Gillespie
Charles Mingus
Thelonious Monk
Lester Young
Sonny Rollins
Wayne Shorter
Herbie Hancock
John McLaughlin
Coleman Hawkins
Mingus
Sinatra - years ago I phoned the London box office (Albert Hall?) and was put off by the ticket price, at the time something like £40 (that's approx £200 today)
Coltrane
Monk
Louis Armstrong
Elvin Jones
Big Joe Turner - years ago a Jazz Journal reviewer urged fans to go hear Turner in a late-career residency in NYC. I thought about it...
Ellington
Wes Montgomery
Tubby Hayes
Steve - Rollins* announced his retirement years ago so you've missed out there (I saw him at Fairfield Hall, Croydon). I'm surprised you didn't see late-career Miles and how come you didn't get to see Herbie Hancock in Newcastle?
Lance - Max Roach played the Newcastle Jazz Festival and you weren't there?!
Russell: I remember Max Roach playing in Newcastle but can't remember why I wasn't there. Maybe I was there!
Digressing, I knew a guy whose lifelong ambition was to see Sun Ra. When a concert by the Arkestra was scheduled to take place in London he naturally bought a not inexpensive ticket. Unfortunately, he set off from Newcastle by train at the crack of dawn and opened the first can shortly after... The upshot is that by the time he got to the concert he was legless and slept right through it which was no mean feat at a Sun Ra concert.
The last time I saw him he was tinkling finger cymbals with a Hare Krishna group on Northumberland St.
Duke
Count B
Louis (that's A, not J)
Miles
Jack Teagarden
Artie Shaw
Charlie Parker
Art Blakey
Lester Young
Sonny Rollins
Dexter Gordon
Oooops - I forgot to include Ella and Billie! How remiss of me ......
Hi Lance
I'd choose quite a few of the iconic players already listed. But here are a few alternative players who are favourites of mine I'd love to have seen. I've included the Miles rhythm section. I have an album I've played endlessly over the years 'Full House' with this rhythm section paired with Wes & Johnny Griffin. A live recording. They are just fantastic.
Roly
Jim Hall
Rene Thomas
Ed Bickert
Richie Kamuca
Hank Mobley
Clifford Brown
Kenny Wheeler
& Miles R/Sec’n - -
Wynton Kelly
Paul Chambers
Jimmy Cobb
Rollins was due to play London Jazz Festival about four years ago but cancelled due to ill health, though I still have the ticket. Late Miles wouldn't interest me at the time since I couldn't afford box ticking and I was living in West Yorkshire when Herbie played the Toon.
One I did see too late in his career was Kenny Wheeler. Though I'm not a fan, it was embarrassing and sad.
Rollins was actually nov 2013. Where do the years go!
My Top Ten Greatest Living Jazz Artists:
1 Sonny Rollins.
2 Wayne Shorter.
3 Herbie Hancock.
4 John McLaughlin.
5 Chick Corea.
6 Ron Carter.
7 Archie Shepp.
8 Wynton Marsalis.
9 Kenny Garrett.
10 Jimmy Cobb.
I could also add/substitute, in no particular order:
Roy Haynes
Charles Lloyd
Barry Harris
Annie Ross
Benny Golson
George Benson
Pat Metheny
David Sanborn
Pete King
Cleo Laine
Whoops! Forgot Joshua Redman!
A list of ten living musicians I'd like to see (in no particular order)...
Roy Haynes
Jimmy Cobb
Maria Schneider
Toshiko Akiyoshi
Bill Charlap
Ron Carter
Jeff 'Tain' Watts
Fred Hersch
James Carter
Darcy James Argue
Thought about Roy Haynes; Benny Golson really just because he goes back so far, and Benson would certainly scrape into a top twenty.
How about only people who emerged after the sixties.
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