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Bebop Spoken There

Branford Marsalis: "As ignorance often forces us to do, you make a generalisation about a musician based on one specific record or one moment in time." - (Jazzwise June 2023).

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!"

Postage

15491 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 15 years ago. 512 of them this year alone and, so far, 133 this month (May 31).

From This Moment On ...

Mon 05: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.

Tue 06: Paul Skerritt @ The Rabbit Hole, Hallgarth St., Durham DH1 3AT. 7:00pm. Paul Skerritt's (solo) weekly residency.
Tue 06: Jam session @ Black Swan, Newcastle Arts Centre. 7:30pm. House trio: Stu Collingwood (piano); Paul Grainger (double bass); Sid White (drums).

Wed 07: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Wed 07: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 07: 4B @ The Exchange, North Shields. 7:00pm.
Wed 07: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm.

Thu 08: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free. CANCELLED! BACK ON JUNE 15.
Thu 08: Easington Colliery Brass Band @ The Lubetkin Theatre, Peterlee. 7:00pm. £10.00.
Thu 08: Faye MacCalman + Blue Dust Archive @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm.
Thu 08: Dilutey Juice + Ceramic @ The Ampitheatre, Sea Road, South Shields. 7:00pm. Free. A South Tyneside Festival event.
Thu 08: Lara Jones w. Vigilance State @ Lubber Fiend, Blandford Square, Newcastle. 7:00pm.
Thu 08: Michael Littlefield @ the Harbour View, Roker, Sunderland. 8:00pm. Free. Country blues.
Thu 08: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman's Club, Middlesbrough. 9:00pm.

Fri 09: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.
Fri 09: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 09: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms, Monkseaton. 1:00pm.
Fri 09: Castillo Nuevo @ Revolución de Cuba, Newcastle. 5:30-8:30pm.
Fri 09: Emma Rawicz @ Sage Gateshead. 8:00pm.

Sat 10: Front Porch Three @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:00pm. Free. Americana, blues, jazz etc.
Sat 10: Merlin Roxby @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. A 'Jar on the Bar' gig.

Sun 11: WORKSHOP: Tim Richards' Jazz Piano Workshop @ JG Windows, Newcastle. Time TBC. Further details tel. 0191 232 1356.
Sun 11: Am Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:30pm. Free.
Sun 11: 4B @ The Exchange, North Shields. 3:00pm.
Sun 11: Groovetrain @ Innisfree Sports & Social Club, Longbenton NE12 8TY. Doors 6:30pm. £15.00 (£7.00. under 16).
Sun 11: Jeffrey Hewer Collective @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.

Mon 12: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm.

Monday, June 14, 2021

Reminiscing in (and out of) Tempo by Andy Hudson - Part Two

Having kicked off last week with the tale of  how, in my first  few months here in the North East, myself and   a fellow student, Ivan Dunne    who shared my passion for both rugby and jazz,   blew our entire SRC grant on supporting a concert by the Duke Ellington Orchestra at the City Hall. I still maintain that it was worth it to hear that horn section with Paul Gonsalves, Johnny Hodges, Harry Carney and the extraordinary Cat Anderson on screaming high note trumpet. We took them out for a pint afterwards - the rest is somewhat hazy…

Talking of hazy, in the mid-1970s I managed a bit of a coup in securing the first ever BBC Live outside broadcast – You’ll perhaps remember that this was achieved by playing Radio 3 Audio along with BBC2 TV.

We constructed an unlikely concert as part of the Newcastle Jazz Festival in November '76 – 4 sets

1. The Alex Welsh Band with Bud Freeman, tenor sax. 2. Soft Machine. 3. The Syd Lawrence Orchestra with Annie Ross, vocal. 4. The Roland Kirk Quintet with Steve Turré, trombone, Hilton Ruiz, piano.

So where’s the hazy bit?

Introduced for Live TV by Spike Milligan …. HINT!

As this was of enormous prestige and high technical challenge, the University Theatre (as it was then) was awash with BBC brass (close to 100 of them mostly staying at the Gosforth Park Hotel).

Hazy part 1 – The Sound check.

Enter stage left – Rahsaan Roland Kirk, crashing into the mic array sending them into the theatre front row. Upon re-assembly, a rather urgent young BBC Floor Manager echoed his instructions from the mobile studio in the car park outside.

Mr Kirk sir could you and the band play a piece for us

“Harrumph! “

Whereupon Kirk hit into a medium swing number Indiana – played in a Lester Young Style that would have happily sat in Steve Andrews’ Savannah Syncopators repertoire.

“Thank you Mr Kirk – perhaps now a more up tempo piece.”

“Mo Fokel “  or something similar.

1-2,-1234 count in by Kirk of at least 280 bpm into a blistering Indiana.

“Thank you Mr Kirk – I believe you play more than one instrument at once – might we hear something?”

“Mo Fukel sona bits” or something similar.

Honk Honk from 2 saxes with the bells right up to the mics followed by a free form complex time band rendering in at least 3 different keys of….wait for it… Indiana!

“Thank you Mr Kirk. All fine!”

Kirk was “mo fukelin” his way off stage with a definite grin and the BBC team breathed a sigh of relief. Myself and the TV producer, Tony Cash were laughing away at the piss-take we had all been experiencing from Kirk.

The concert was, as you might expect from the line-up, of exceptional quality.

If you wanted totally predictable spot on delivery of timed autocue reportage commensurate with all the top brass of the BBC present – who would be the last person you would engage as the presenter – you got it - Spike Milligan.

ROLLING

Off the credits and into Spike in 5- 4- 3 -2 -1…- Camera 1

The Auto cue rolled and some bland text eased up the screen about to introduce the big start of Syd Lawrence. At which point Spike took out a monocle and glared threateningly into the camera affecting a German accent.

“Ladies unt Gentlemen - This is not known generally but during zee war, Syd Lawrence was a Luftwaffe pilot, who shot down Glenn Miller just to steal his arrangements unt here he is tonight to play zem – HERR SYD LAWRENCE!”

Syd and the band took at least 10 secs to stop laughing and start playing. The BBC went into the first of many flat spins, until the talented Director Robin Lough just winged it which in a sense was a better manifestation of the jazz genre.

Other memorable parts of the show to me were Soft Machine’s, John Marshall who’s drum kit was quite the largest I’d ever seen…AND of course Roland Kirk, who having crashed on stage which was the only thing that was consistent with his sound check, introduced his set with a crude sound coming from a small recorder under his shirt – The BBC thought there was breakthrough from some other sound source and were in an ultra-flat ultra-spin. But Kirk explained that Ain’t Misbehavin’ was a way of introducing his set which was to be a tribute to Fats Waller with solos on conch and many other surprises for the now, busking in the best possible way, BBC crew.

I did take Kirk along to Roy’s Two Rooms in Gallowgate for a bite to eat. I am not sure that the patron at the time, Roy Santos, had ever seen a large black man wearing a top hat have steak and fries PLUS Peach Melba….All on the same plate!

I am told, but haven’t checked myself, that extracts of that show can be purchased from the archives https://www.loc.gov/item/jots.200022199/ - Andy H.

See also: Reminiscing in (and out of) Tempo by Andy Hudson -Part One.

3 comments :

Cormac Loane said...

Fascinating reminiscences, Andy! Was that Ellington's 70th birthday concert in 1969? I was there as a 14-year-old schoolboy who had recently discovered jazz. I ventured backstage after the gig to collect autographs from the sax section - unfortunately, the only one I could find was Russell Procope. It sounds like Hodges, Gonsalves and the rest were across the road having a pint with you - if only I'd known! (And, by the way, thank you for allowing me to join the Newcastle Big Band a couple of years later - I was so lucky to have that amazing apprenticeship as a musician!)

Roly said...

I remember going a couple of times to an enjoyable jazz session in Gosforth with Cormac on alto. I knew of him from the Newcastle Big Band Sunday lunchtime sessions. It was a classic bebop quintet playing Parker stuff - Donna Lee etc. Was it at the Gosforth Hotel? An upstairs room I think. What was the full line up?
Roly

cadie@protonmail.com said...

Being a member of the audience at the time and having just re-listened to the BBC Festival broadcast from '76 with Spike Milligan's witticisms it was nice to read of these insider comments from the time of the recordings..............

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