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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

17372 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 656 of them this year alone and, so far, 61 this month (Sept. 17).

From This Moment On ...

September

Fri 20: Lindsay Hannon’s Tom Waits for No Man @ Gala Theatre, Durham. 1:00pm. £8.00. SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Rob Hall & Chick Lyall @ The Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 1:00pm. Free (donations). SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 20: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 20: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 20: Leeway @ 1719, Hendon, Sunderland. 7:30pm. The Old Black Cat Jazz Club. CANCELLED!
Fri 20: Gaz Hughes Trio @ Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. Opus 4 Jazz Club.

Sat 21: Jason Isaacs @ Seaburn STACK, Seaburn. 1:00-2:45pm. Free.
Sat 21: Vieux Carré Hot Four @ The Beehive, Hartley Lane, Earsdon Whitley Bay NE25 0SZ. 4:30pm-6:30pm.
Sat 21: Baghdaddies @ Two by Two, Albion Row, Byker, Newcastle NE6 1RQ. 6:00pm.
Sat 21: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Northumberland Club, Jesmond, Newcastle. 7:00pm. SOLD OUT!
Sat 21: Jude Murphy & Alan Law @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.

Sun 22: More Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: Jason Isaacs @ St James’ STACK, Newcastle. 2:30-4:30pm. Free.
Sun 22: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ Queen’s Hall, Hexham. 3:00pm.
Sun 22: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: Richard Herdman @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sun 22: Remy CB Band @ Blues Underground, Nelson St., Newcastle. 8:30pm. Free. Remi, 2024 Newcastle Uni graduate, superb soul/blues voice!

Mon 23: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Paul Booth with the Paul Edis Trio @ The Black Bull, Blaydon. 8:00pm. £10.00. A Blaydon Jazz Club 40th anniversary concert! SOLD OUT!

Tue 24: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ Newcastle House Hotel, Rothbury. 7:30pm. £12.00. (£10.00. adv. from Tully’s of Rothbury). Coquetdale Jazz.
Tue 24: Sarah Gillespie @ The Cluny, Newcastle. 7:30pm (doors). £16.50. Duo performance with Chris Montague.

Wed 25: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 25: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 25: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.
Wed 25: Moonlight Serenade Orchestra UK: Glenn Miller & Big Band Spectacular @ Middlesbrough Theatre. 7:30pm.

Thu 26: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 26: Gateshead Jazz Appreciation Society @ Brunswick Methodist Church, Newcastle NE1 7BJ. 2:00pm. £4.00. ‘Contemporary Jazz & the Piano’.
Thu 26: The New 58 Jazz Collective @ Hops & Cheese, Hartlepool. 7:30pm. Free.
Thu 26: Jo Harrop & Friends @ Hexham Abbey. 8:00pm. ‘An Evening with Jo Harrop & Friends’. A Hexham Abbey Festival of Music & Arts event. £20.00., £5.00. child/student.
Thu 26: Neil Yates & Tom Remon @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Thu 26: Loco House Band @ Bar Loco, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free.
Thu 26: Tees Hot Club @ Dorma’s Club, Middlesborough. 8:30pm. Free. Mark Toomey, Neil Brodie, Graham Thompson, Adrian Beadnell.

Thursday, April 15, 2021

Ten 10" Albums I still play (occasionally). 2: Vic Dickenson Septet Vol. 1

Listening today, nearly 70 years on, it initially, made me wonder what all the fuss was about. Well, I think it was possibly because it was one of the first albums where Stanley Dance came up with the label mainstream as opposed to swing. It may not seem important now but, back then, swing meant big band flag-wavers whereas mainstream drew attention to those musicians caught in between the traditionalists, the big bands and the boppers.

Most of the musicians here had dipped their toes into some, if not all, of the waters.

Braff went on to play with Goodman, Dickenson was ex-Basie, the self-knighted Thompson took his own Basie-take into bopland and, whilst Edmund Hall had no affinity to bop - few clarinetists had - he knew his place and, in that place he reigned supreme. Page, the rock behind Basie's early discs is equally solid here. I don't know too much about guitarist Steve Jordan or drummer Les Erskine but they do the business with the end result being a session that proved that genres only exist as an example of the futility of genres. I'm not going to quote Duke's much used phrase that there are only two kinds of music - you know the rest - but instead to say that there is a lot of music that is worth listening to in between the good and the bad.

Braff is the most interesting, some might say the most obnoxious, of the horns but, irrespective of his, I'm told, abrasive personality he was the most identifiable trumpet player to emerge back in the early 1950s. Nobody sounded like him - and he knew it! 

Dickenson likewise. That growl sound he got told you who was blowing trombone and there was no grounds for error unless you wondered if Kid Ory had taken some lessons from Trummy Young.

Two tracks: Jeepers Creepers and Russian Lullaby. As I said earlier, my first reaction, upon listening again, was, is this what I've built a shrine to for all these years? But, as the music enveloped me, I knew - this was the truth as I heard it back then - maybe it still is ... Lance.

Ruby Braff  (cornet); Vic Dickenson (trombone); Edmund Hall (clarinet)* Sir Charles  Thompson (piano); Steve Jordan (guitar); Walter Page (bass); Les Erskine (drums).

* Inexplicably Hall's name is missing from the front cover!

1 comment :

Miles said...

I have a double CD which has Volumes 1,2,3,4 of the septet, Vols. 3 & 4 substitutes Shad Collins on trumpet and Jo Jones on drums. It is always worth a listen as it is an object lesson on how it should be done.
Miles.

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