Bebop Spoken There

Ludovic Beier (Django Festival Allstars): ''Manouche means 'free man,' and gypsies have been travelers since they migrated west from India to Europe.'' (DownBeat March, 2026)

The Things They Say!

This is a good opportunity to say thanks to BSH for their support of the jazz scene in the North East (and beyond) - it's no exaggeration to say that if it wasn't for them many, many fine musicians, bands and projects across a huge cross section of jazz wouldn't be getting reviewed at all, because we're in the "desolate"(!) North. (M & SSBB on F/book 23/12/24)

Postage

18361 (and counting) posts since we started blogging 18 years ago. 215 of them this year alone and, so far this month (Mar. 8 ), 25

From This Moment On ...

March

Fri 13: Paul Skerritt Quartet @ Bishop Auckland Methodist Church. 1:00pm . £9.00.
Fri 13: The SH#RP Collective @ Jesmond Library, Newcastle. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 13: Classic Swing @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 13: Rendezvous Jazz @ The Monkseaton Arms. 1:00pm. Free.
Fri 13: New Orleans Preservation Jazz Band @ The Oxbridge Hotel, Stockton. 1:00pm. £5.00.
Fri 13: Soothsayers + Rookie Numbers @ Cobalt Studios, Newcastle. 7:00pm (doors). £17.51., £14.33., £11.16.

Sat 14: The Too Bad Jims @ Claypath Deli, Durham. 7:00pm (6:30pm doors). £13.20., £11.00. R&B.
Sat 14: NUJO @ Venue, Newcastle University Students’ Union. Time TBC. £15.00. supporter; £10.00. standard; £5.00. student. Seated event.

Sun 15: Michael Young Trio @ The Engine Room, Sunderland. 2:30pm. Free.
Sun 15: The Too Bad Jims @ The Georgian Theatre, Stockton. 3:00pm. £12.00. R&B.
Sun 15: 4B @ The Ticket Office, Whitley Bay. 3:00pm. Free.
Sun 15: Rebecca Poole @ The Globe, Newcastle. 8:00pm. £14.00., £12.00., £7.00. Poole w. Dean Stockdale & Ken Marley. CANCELLED!

Mon 16: Milne Glendinning Band @ Yamaha Music School, Blyth. 1:00pm.
Mon 16: Friends of Jazz @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Mon 16: Russ Morgan Quartet @ The Black Bull, Blaydon. 8:00pm. £10.00.

Tue 17: Jam session @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free. House trio: Alan Law (piano); Paul Grainger (double bass); Scotty Adair (drums).

Wed 18: Vieux Carré Jazzmen @ Cullercoats Crescent Club. 1:00pm. Free.
Wed 18: Darlington Big Band @ Darlington & Simpson Rolling Mills Social Club, Darlington. 7:00pm. Free. Rehearsal session (open to the public).
Wed 18: The ’58 Jazz Collective @ Hartlepool Cricket Club, West Park, 7:30pm. £7.00.
Wed 18: Brand New Heavies @ The Glasshouse, Gateshead. 7:30pm.
Wed 18: Take it to the Bridge @ The Globe, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.

Thu 19: Jazz Appreciation North East @ Brunswick Methodist Church, Newcastle NE1 7BJ. 2:00pm. £5.00. Subject: Stephen Joshua Sondheim.
Thu 19: FILM: Köln 75 @ Forum Cinema, Hexham. 7:30pm. £10.00., £7.00., £3.00. Dir. Ido Fluk. Fictional account of Keith Jarrett’s 1975 Köln concert. A Tyne Valley Film Festival preview screening.
Thu 19: Ransom Van @ The Black Swan, Newcastle. 7:30pm. Free.

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

Saturday, November 09, 2024

The Classic Jazz Party: Saturday evening jam session @ the Village Hotel, North Tyneside - Nov. 2

A mid-morning film screening followed by an afternoon concert schedule and an exhilarating evening session, it had been a long, enjoyable Saturday at the Classic Jazz Party. Time for bed? Don't be silly, it's time for the late night jam session! 

All seats taken, the beer flowing, crisps being munched (oddly, the Pub and Grill stocks Ready Salted, Ready Salted or Ready Salted), at something like 11:15pm Richard Exall mustered the house band and off they/we went. Exall's frontline partners - Malo Mazurié (trumpet) and Alistair Allan (trombone) - helping to share the load before a shedload of hopefuls got the nod.

Swing That Music set an impossibly high standard, the joint jumpin', top that! Well, with A-listers at every turn - David Boeddinghaus (piano), the French rhythm aces Félix Hunot (banjo, guitar) and Henry Lemaire (string bass) and Londoner Richard Pite swinging like nobody's business behind the traps - the pace didn't flag for so much as a nanosecond. Cia Tomasso singing Drop Me Off in Harlem...were we in a hotel around the corner from West Allotment or in a NYC jazz joint? Superb! Alistair Allan's ballad feature Stardust deservedly won sustained applause. Magical.

Another pint of Guinness, please. And some crisps. Oh, yeah, Ready Salted. Meanwhile, from the jazz stage (more like the floor) Panama tore the place apart. This was thirsty work. Another pint of Guinness, please! The Tenements' John Youngs was in the house, first sitting in on banjo, later string bass. Top man, JY. Graham Hughes ditched his trombone to wrestle with a sousaphone, Rico Tomasso laid down his more familiar trumpet to play trombone - great stuff! Michael McQuaid, on alto sax, later switching to tenor, Jack Calloway blowing clarinet as if there were no tomorrow, Gavin Rice playing drums (the award-winning Rice is a veritable multi-instrumentalist), Harry Evans taking up the string bass, Big Butter and Egg Man and many, many more favourites kept the pot boiling. It was gone 1:00am. Another pint of Guinness and a Pinot Grigio, please! Do you have any crisps? Ready Salted? They'll do. Thanks. West Allotment or NYC, we weren't going anywhere, anytime soon. Russell  
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