Just read your piece re Simon Spillett and the comment therein from Bill Shaw, which I absolutely agree with. I enclose a little piece I wrote a few years ago after a particularly happy night at the little Roundhouse Theatre in Staveley, near Windermere. At just short of 60 I was the baby of the band - Tim Belford was 90 and blind by then - but everything seemed to fall into place that night, so when I got home, still buzzing, I poured a refreshing glass of Scottish fluid and sat down and wrote this to try and capture the feeling on paper before it dissipated.
I can't say it was the best night I ever had, but it was certainly one of them, and I'm glad I made a record (although, sadly, not a recording!) to remember it by. Steve Andrews.
NIRVANA, 8th March, 2013
Friday night, just before 8pm. I've just scribbled a programme and we're
standing in the corridor chatting like old friends, which we are, while the
organiser is making his introductions in the little theatre. We're so relaxed
we don't notice that he has finished and he has to come and get us. Nice
friendly applause from a capacity audience of 60 or so as we walk out - this is
a small venue, circular, and with perfect acoustics: no mics here!
No nerves as I pick up the tenor, but as always, a sense of the importance
of this first number to settle the band and the audience down, and more
importantly, for me to assess how I'm going to perform this evening. Count
Basie's Doggin' Around, Bb, tempo
spot on but drummer pushing it, so I sit heavily on the back of the beat at the
beginning of my solo to pull him back, and he relaxes into it. Applause. I'm
relaxed now, and announce the tune as Doggin'
Around by Basie from the 1930's, when Dogging had an entirely different
meaning from today. Pause for small laugh, then follow with: "and if any
of you know what it means today, you ought to be ashamed of yourselves!"
Surprising big laugh, considering the average age of the crowd is about seventy
- like the band!
We move into Out of Nowhere in G
at a relaxed swing. Rhythm section has settled down now and is swinging nicely
so I can concentrate on me. This tune works beautifully in this key (A on
tenor) and my fingers know their way around the chords without any conscious
effort on my part. I'm listening to the tone - this tenor and I have been
together now for 17 years and we know each other's foibles, but it still
surprises me with the depth and quality of sound it can achieve on the right
occasion. How much is me and how much the horn, I truly don't know. I have
played twice this week and not been very pleased with my sound, but tonight
it's just right: big, dark, and round, with just a touch of huskiness around
the edges. Think mid-1930's Coleman Hawkins with perhaps a touch of Ben Webster's
1940-ish ballad sound on something like Chelsea
Bridge. Tonight the horn speaks from a whisper to a roar without effort on
my part - it's almost as though I'm not there.
I'm concentrating now on creating melody; not the composer's melody, but a
melodic improvisation in the footsteps of Armstrong, Beiderbecke, Hawkins and
the other great masters of this craft. Turning a phrase round, following with
another phrase which complements the first, thinking just ahead of myself,
marrying tonal quality, phrasing and variations of volume and pitch. And then
it happens. I realise that I have stepped out of myself, detached myself from
the audience, the band, the occasion, and time has all of a sudden slowed right
down. I'm listening to myself, analysing and adjusting and polishing as I go
along. There's no urgency, the me that is outside of me is in total control of
the situation; I'm even watching myself and the movements that I make while
playing, the way I hold the horn: straight out in front at first then lean to
the left a little, bend the neck forward and swing the bow of the saxophone
over my right hip against the wallet in my trouser pocket. Ordinary time has
stopped now, and I have all the time in the world to concentrate on perfecting
this solo. Then it's finished. A smattering of applause, and Tim begins his
piano chorus, hewing close to the melody, respecting the composer, simple and
beautiful, while I return to earth. Last chorus. I restate the melody, my still
heightened consciousness noticing that I'm phrasing it exactly as I did on the
first chorus; it just seems right, I can't improve on it.
Applause. We look at each other smiling: we know that was good. That five
or six minutes made up for all the nights when it doesn't quite work, when that
indefinable something just isn't there. We're eager to get on, to recreate the
moment; and we will. It's going to be a special night. Talk of the Town in F, straight in, one, two three,
four.........."
Steve Andrews (tenor saxophone/clarinet); Tim Belford (piano);
Roy Cansdale (string bass); Brian Teagle (drums)
5 comments :
A good read! Is there more in diaries from down the years?
Hi Steve,
those moments don't happen often, but when they do.....................
You're right! They don't happen very often ...
It was New Years Eve 1971 and I was working in J.G.Windows music store when Brian Fisher rang me. "What are you doing tonight? Have you got a gig?"
I went through the motions, "Tonight? What date is it? oh, New Year's Eve. I'll check my diary." I counted up to ten then said, "Looks like I've had a cancellation."
"Good, then be at the Bay Hotel in Seaburn for 8:00pm - best bib and tucker."
"Hang on," I said, "Who's on the gig?"
"I'm on bass, Billy Nicholson's on trumpet and Peter McKeith's on drums.!
"Who's on piano?"
"You're in luck - I've got Peter Jacobson on piano."
In luck! Peter Jacobson was the best jazz pianist in the northeast at the time and soon to become one of the best in the country!
I can't handle this. When someone offers you a gig mid afternoon on NYE you know they aren't working alphabetically. I was about to decline - and then he mentioned the fee. By my standards, even for a NYE it was astronomical. I said, "I'll do it."
I wish I'd recorded it although, listening back, it would probably have been a let down.
Although it was a dance, it was also a jazz gig. Even things like the Hokey Cokey and the Gay Gordons swung. We even managed to turn the latter number into Benny Golson's Blues March! It was one of those nights when everything just fell into place and I floated home on a cloud.
I met Peter Jacobson a few years later and Brian Fisher reminded him of the gig.
"Don't remember that one" he said.
Ah well ...
As a non-musician one of those special nights occurred on 25 November 2005. The Saville Exchange, as it then was, in North Shields presented a quartet featuring Lewis Watson (Adam Dennis, Ken Marley and Adrian Tilbrook). Lewis was on top form - to this untrained ear he was never anything other than on top form. Mid-concert Lewis introduced A Weaver of Dreams, dedicating Victor Young's tune to George Best who had died earlier that day. So, Lewis was a football fan, not least a fan of the great George Best! To this day I'm yet to hear better tenor saxophone playing.
Lance, your recent mention of the late, great Peter Jacobsen reminded me of one my earliest musical encounters with him many, many years ago........
Brian Fisher had a mid-week residency for a jazz trio in the lounge of the then rather grand Five Bridges Hotel in Gateshead and it was the place to see and be seen. I had the temerity to ask Brian, as an aspiring player, if I could 'sit in' on double bass - he couldn't say "yes" quickly enough. The notorious Jackie Denton was on drums - the Art Blakey of the North-East!
"Let's play a blues to get started" said Peter and off we launched into a madcap medley of tunes including Cool Blues, Now's The Time and many others hinted at or incorporated into the mix. Already sweating pints, I suggested A Night in Tunisia in D Minor. "OK" said the maestro and we were off with Jackie ferociously trying to outplay everyone and Peter responding as only he could. At the end of the piano solo I got the nod - Denton reduced the volume to loud and I was off. Man, I was all over that bass like Scott LaFaro (as if!) as Pete fed me the chords. It's a great tune for the bass with lots of open strings. A smattering of applause.
"Let’s cool it a bit with On Green Dolphin Street" was the next call and a memorable version of that lovely song was the end of 'my night with the stars'.
The residency continued for several weeks and I had further opportunities to further my jazz education as time went by.
Dave B
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