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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

17421 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 16 years ago. 695 of them this year alone and, so far, 100 this month (Sept. 30).

From This Moment On ...

October

Wed 09: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free. Wed 09: Jason Isaacs @ St James’ STACK, Newcastle. 5:00-7:00pm. Free.
Wed 09: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 09: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.
Wed 09: The Tannery Jam Session @ The Tannery, Gilesgate, Hexham. 7:00-9:00pm. Free. A ‘second Wednesday in the month’ jam session.
Wed 09: Shunya, Dudù Kouate & Seb Rochford @ The Cluny, Newcastle. 8:30pm (7:30pm doors). £21.00.

Thu 10: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ The Holystone, Whitley Road, North Tyneside. 1:00pm. Free.
Thu 10: Gateshead Jazz Appreciation Society @ Brunswick Methodist Church, Newcastle NE1 7BJ. 2:00pm. £4.00. ‘Collaborations - it happened all the time’.
Thu 10: Indigo Jazz Voices w. the Little Big Band @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:45pm. £5.00.
Thu 10: Side Cafe Orkestar @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Free. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
The 10: Classic Swing @ Carlisle Rugby Club, Warwick Rd., Carlisle. 8:30pm. £9.
Thu 10: Tees Hot Club @ Dorman’s Club, Middlesborough. 8:30pm. With guests Donna Hewitt (sax); Bill Watson (trumpet); Graham Thompson (keys); Ron Smith (bass). Free.

Fri 11: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 11: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 11: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 11: Dulcie May Moreno @ The Old Library, Auckland Castle, Bishop Auckland. 1:00pm. £8.00.
Fri 11: The Jazz Quartet + Stratosphonic @ Tynedale Rugby Club, Corbridge. 7:00pm. £15.00. A Rotary Club of Hexham event. The Jazz Quartet (Jude Murphy & co), Stratosphonic (blues/rock). CANCELLED!
Fri 11: Joe Steels Trio @ The Pele, Market Place, Corbridge NE45 5AW. 7:30pm. Free.
Fri 11: Crooners @ Tyne Theatre, Newcastle. 7:30pm.
Fri 11: Mo Scott Band @ Blues Underground, Nelson St., Newcastle. 9:00pm. Free.

Sat 12: Milne-Glendinning Band @ The Vault, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free.
Sat 12: Michael Woods @ Victoria Tunnel, Ouseburn, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £12.00. (£10.00. adv.). Country blues guitar & vocals.
Sat 12: Nauta @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm. £13.28, £11.16, £9.04. A two-track recording launch gig.
Sat 12: Stuart Turner @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 8:00pm. Rockabilly, rhythm & blues etc. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig.
Sat 12: Lapwing Jazz Trio @ The Ship Inn, Low Newton. 8:00pm. Free. New trio: Paula Whitty, Richard Herdman, Jude Murphy.

Sun 13: Am Jam @ The Globe, Newcastle. 2:00pm. Free.
Sun 13: Emma Wilson @ Tyne Bar, Newcastle. 4:00pm. Free. Blues.
Sun 13: Catfish Keith @ The Cluny. 7:00pm. Country blues.
Sun 13: Cath Stephens & Paul Grainger @ Prohibition Bar, Newcastle. 7:00pm. A ‘Jar on the Bar’ gig. Stephens & Grainger, one third of a triple bill.
Sun 13: Dulcie May Moreno Quartet @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm.

Mon 14: Harmony Brass @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 14: Black is the Color of My Voice @ Hippodrome, Darlington. 7:30pm. Apphia Campbell’s one-woman show inspired by Nina Simone, performed by Nicholle Cherrie.

Tue 15: Jam session @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free. House trio: Alan Law (piano), Paul Grainger (double bass), Bailey Rudd (drums).

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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