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Bebop Spoken There

Kurt Elling: ''There's something to learn from every musician you play with''. (DownBeat, December 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

17630 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 904 of them this year alone and, so far, 49 this month (Dec. 20).

From This Moment On ...

December

Fri 20: Edison Herbert Trio @ The Lit & Phil, Newcastle. 1:00pm. 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: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 1:00-3:00pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Fri 20: Baghdaddies @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm. SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Smokin’ Spitfires @ Platform 1, East Bedlington Community Centre. 7:00pm.
Fri 20: Pete Tanton’s Christmas @ 1719, Hendon, Sunderland. 7:30pm. CANCELLED!
Fri 20: Alligator Gumbo @ Saltburn Community Hall. 7:30pm. SOLD OUT!
Fri 20: Abbie Finn’s Finntet @ The Traveller’s Rest, Darlington. 8:00pm. Opus 4 Jazz Club.
Fri 20: Brass Fiesta @ Revoluçion de Cuba, Newcastle. 10:30pm. Free.

Sat 21: Lindsay Hannon Quartet @ Central Bar, Gateshead. 2:00pm. £15.00. ‘Swinging with Christmas Songs’.
Sat 21: Jason Isaacs @ Seaburn STACK, Seaburn. 3:30-5:30pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Sat 21: Jackson’s Wharf Xmas Party @ Jackson’s Wharf, Hartlepool. 7:00pm. Free. Featuring the New ’58 Jazz Collective.
Sat 21: Brass Fiesta @ Revoluçion de Cuba, Newcastle. 10:30pm. Free.

Sun 22: Hot Club du Nord @ The Globe, Newcastle. 1:00pm. £15.00. + bf. Xmas party. SOLD OUT!
Sun 22: Red Kites Jazz @ Gibside Chapel, nr. Rowlands Gill. 1:00pm. Admission charge applies.
Sun 22: Paul Skerritt @ Hibou Blanc, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free. Vocalist Skerritt working with backing tapes.
Sun 22: Ruth Lambert Trio @ The Juke Shed, Union Quay, North Shields. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 22: Revolutionaires @ Tyne Bar, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. Superb rhythm & blues outfit.
Sun 22: Laurence Harrison, Paul Grainger & Mark Robertson @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Line-up TBC.
Sun 22: The Globe Xmas Party @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:00pm. Free. Live music (musicians TBC).
Sun 22: Ray Stubbs R & B All-Stars @ Zerox, Sandhill, Newcastle. 7:00pm (doors).

Mon 23: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Wheatsheaf, Benton Sq., Whitley Road, Palmersville NE12 9SU. Tel: 0191 266 8137. 1:00pm. Free. CANCELLED!
Mon 23: Edison Herbert Trio @ The Vault, Darlington. 4:00pm. Free.
Mon 23: Jason Isaacs @ St. James’ STACK, Newcastle. 4:00-6:00pm. Free. Vocalist Isaacs working with backing tapes.
Mon 23: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.

Tue 24: Lindsay Hannon & Mark Williams @ Ernest, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 11:00am-1:00pm. Free.
Tue 24: Paul Skerritt @ Mambo Wine & Dine, South Shields. 1:00pm. Free. Vocalist Skerritt working with backing tapes.

Wed 25: Wot? No jazz!

Thu 26: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free. TBC.
Thu 26: The Boneshakers @ Tyne Bar, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. The 17th annual Boneshakers’ Shindig.

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

Tuesday, July 20, 2021

If Gabriel ever needs a UK dep ...


It's too darn hot to post anything of substance so I thought I'd draw up a top ten list of British trumpet players that I've heard over the years and across the genres. To avoid controversy I've listed them in alphabetical order.

Bruce Adams. I've heard Bruce in small group settings with Alan Barnes - the way they bounce things off each other both musically and verbally is pure magic. Likewise, on gigs with SSBB and CHBB, he never fails to bring something extra to the table. The last time I heard him with Strictly Smokin' at the Globe it wasn't his first solo or even his first chorus - it was his first note! Good job they'd battened down the hatches! 

Kenny Baker. I only once heard Kenny live when he was touring the halls as part of a variety show at Newcastle Empire. If memory serves me right, he was second banana to Dorothy Squires! Imagine having that as an epitaph! However, my lasting memories are of those Friday night BBC Light Programme sessions: "Let's Settle For Music". Perhaps the greatest examples of mainstream jazz ever heard in this country.

Ian Carr. Ah the memories of hearing Ian with the Emcee 5 at the old Downbeat Club in Newcastle. Perhaps the most innovative of the modern Miles inspired trumpet players to emerge in the early sixties he certainly ensured that Newcastle was more than a "Trad Town". After Nucleus I tended to listen less but still cherish those heady nights down Carliol Square.

James Copus. The inclusion of this young man may seem a premature choice but, after I heard him the other week at the 606 I knew he was something special! His recent album gave us a clue but, hearing him live was something else. It's not often these jazzworn, jaded, ears get excited about a "new star" but this was one occasion when it felt like I was discovering jazz for the first time!

Digby Fairweather. I first heard Digby on a lunchtime gig at the Barbican Centre. I heard him again with Daryl Sherman on consecutive nights at North Shields and Gosforth. Probably the nearest we've ever got to Ruby Braff (musically) in this country.

Henry Lowther. As recently as last Saturday I heard Henry on a livestream from 606. This was just a few days after his 80th birthday. Did his venerable status show? You betcha! It showed in the playing. The notes, the phrases, the technique that only a lifetime's dedication to the music could produce. The last time I heard Henry live was at Pizza Express for the 2018 the APPJAG awards. A legend.

Bobby Pratt/Bert Ezard. Impossible to separate them. Their duets with the Ted Heath Orchestra could only have been equalled had Maynard Ferguson and Cat Anderson squared off in front of Kenton or Ellington. Two numbers I recall from record and at the City Hall are Memories of You and Bill (from Showboat).

Ryan Quigley. I'd gone to Edinburgh to hear Randy Brecker with the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra at the Queen's Hall. Brecker was great - when is he not? - but my lasting memory was of Ryan hitting those high notes. Me and any dogs who were listening had a ball. A few years earlier, I'd heard Ryan at the Corner House, Newcastle, along with Paul Booth and Paul Towndrow. What a great team they made.

Freddy Randall. I know Humph, Halcox and Colyer, were, understandably, regarded as being at the forefront of the so-called jazz revival but none had the drive of Randall. The others, dedicated as they were to New Orleans, lacked the fire of Randall's Chicagoan trumpet playing. Humph, of course moved on to a more modern/mainstream setting ultimately becoming the face of British jazz. But, when it came to kick ass - Freddy had an extra leg!

Steve Waterman. Steve, like so many, seems to have slipped off the radar of late however, as a tutor at the London Trinity College of Music he has been sharing his wisdom on line and it looks like he'll be gigging again in October. I first heard him with, I think, Alan Barnes at a Scarborough Jazz Festival and again at the old Side Café down on Newcastle Quayside. The audience stayed at home on that occasion and I've been been looking down my nose with an air of superiority at the absentees ever since.

I realise now that picking out 10 was impossible so apologies to Guy Barker, Harry Beckett, Kenny Ball, Eddie Blair, Les Condon, Bert Courtley, Jimmy Deuchar, Al Fairweather, Freddy Gavita, Albert Hall, Stu and Ian Hamer, Dickie Hawdon, Pete Horsfall,  Laura Jurd, Mick Mulligan, Dick Pearce, Dizzy Reece, Enrico Tomasso, Byron Wallen, Alex Welsh et al.  I never heard Nat Gonella live and, as Kenny Wheeler was Canadian, he didn't qualify either. Lance

(Photo: l:r clockwise: James Copus, Henry Lowther, Bruce Adams, Ryan Quigley, Digby Fairweather, Ian Carr, Steve Waterman)

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