Celebrating the Joy of Jazz
Jay Darwish, Adrian Cox, TJ Johnson & Tony Pitt
I have to thank Raye Caluori, Chief Sound Engineer at The 100 Club, for letting me invade his Control Booth to video. It was much easier filming from “on high” and to an extent I even managed to overcome the renowned pillar obstruction.
(Photos & YouTube © Peter M Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Wednesday, 28th January, 2015, saw TJ Johnson’s Bourbon Kick play a night of
New Orleans music at London’s iconic 100 Club. Host to many great bands over the years,
this 100 Club Special brought back echoes of it’s glorious jazz heritage. What’s more, it could herald a 100 Club Jazz Revival!
TJ.
TJ and Adrian Cox brought together the UK’s finest exponents of New Orleans inspired jazz on the night:
TJ Johnson – Drums/Vocals
Adrian Cox – Saxophone/Clarinet/Vocals
Sky Murphy – Trombone/Vocals
Tony Pitt – Banjo
Roger Myerscough – Clarinet/Saxophone
Jay Darwish – Double Bass
Adrian Cox
Tony Pitt
Jay Darwish (Courtesy Silvie’s Place)
BELOW: “CHINA BOY DON’T SLEEP” Joyous Jazz at the last 100 Club Thursday Midday Gig. Yet are we seeing new beginnings?
Olney Jazz Club changes the style of music again for our next gig, 8.00pm, Tuesday, February 3rd, with, for the first time, Graham Hughes’ Sunshine Kings Jazz Band, London’s top jazz and swing band. This will be a great night of jazz inspired by the music of New Orleans, the singing and dancing of the 1920s and the dixieland and trad revivals in America and the UK since then.
Tickets still held at £10 or £8 in advance from the Carlton House Club: 01234 711348
Or by email to Alan Haughton: [email protected]
Tickets are already flying so best to get yours now!
Graham at The 100 Club with Barry Martyn’s Young Bloods, 2010. (Photo © Peter M Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Graham has recently been appointed to the challenging task of organising this year’s Keswick Jazz Festival, Thursday 7th – Sunday 10th May, and promises a refreshing mix of popular jazz genres and younger bands.
To learn more visit: Keswick Jazz Festival 2015|
Tuesday March 3rd we are pleased to welcome back one of the top UK bands, the Amy Roberts/Richard Exall Quintet with their unique, eclectic repertoire from the golden years. The band also features Bill Coleman on bass, John Watson on drums and yours truly on piano.
Tickets £10 or £8 in advance from the Carlton House Club: 01234 711348
Or by email to Alan Haughton: [email protected]
Don’t forget to book if you would like to eat: two main courses for £10. Carlton House Club: 01234 711348
Looking forward to seeing you for these two great sessions.
Alan
Olney Jazz Club
www.olneyjazzclub.com
[email protected]
www.alanhaughton.com
With its 2015 programme, Keswick promises a UK festival to challenge our Continental “rivals”. Graham Hughes recently posted: “Jennings Keswick Jazz Festival festival now has a website. Do tell everyone about it. It’ll be really fun. Hoping to make this year the best ever, and sow the seeds of a revitalised festival that will continue for years to come to showcase all the great new bands that are popping up all the time. Grand aspirations I know!”
The Festival Website Introduction spells it out:
“Firmly established as Britain’s foremost celebration of traditional, New Orleans, swing and mainstream jazz.
“Fabulous international guests and top UK talent in this large and warm-hearted gathering of people who all love to listen and dance to the great music that the Keswick Jazz Festival is renowned for.
“Over 90 inspiring performances in this four day feast of jazz, with a further three days of concerts in Theatre By The Lake preceding the main festival.
“Music from days of jazz when it began – Jelly Roll Morton and Kid Ory, and from the glory days of traditional jazz in the UK – Midnight Follies, Chris Barber, Ken Colyer, to the fat and hip-swinging music of the New Orleans brass bands and Cajun style bands, also the jumping sounds of the jive bands, intimate gipsy jazz, powerful and inspiring vocalists, some of the finest stride pianists you’ll hear in the UK… the list goes on.”
When if comes to the future of jazz, how about this for a selection of just some of the younger jazz stars appearing at Keswick (hit the links to discover more):
Old Hat Jazz Band (© P.M. Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Amy Roberts and Richard Exall (© P.M. Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Richard Exall / Amy Roberts Quintet
Dynamic Baby Jools (© P.M. Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Baby Jools and the Jazzaholics
Brownfield / Byrne Hot Six
Russ & Rich Bennett (© P.M. Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Richard Bennett / Adrian Cox Band
TJ Johnson’s Band Ignites The Crypt (© P.M. Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Jake Leg Jug Band
Dom Pipkin (© P.M. Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Mellow Baku (© P.M. Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Ben Cummings
Craig Milverton
Craig Milverton
Michael McQuaid
Jamie Brownfield
Best see for yourselves so visit http://www.keswickjazzfestival.com without delay!
Tel: 01604 858549 for further information
Web: http://www.tadnewtonsjazzfriends.com
email: [email protected]
Tad Newton’s Jazz Friends with Trevor Whiting on sax
Old Hat Jazz Band
Back in October, 2013, I featured London based Old Hat Jazz Band on Jazz&Jazz in a post entitled “Capturing the Quintessential Sound of Early Jazz”. I quoted Mike Pointon’s article in Just Jazz (July, 2013) – Old Hat “are anything but old hat … but a talented young group – all in their twenties – playing a repertoire that owes nothing to British influences or Euro Trad.”
Old Hat introduce themselves as “some of London’s finest young jazz musicians, playing hot and swinging jazz from the 20s and 30s and their original tunes for your listening and dancing delight.” They list their genre as Jazz / Swing / Blues / New Orleans Jazz.
Band Leader Elizabeth Exell has now announced the date for their the EP launch. It is to be on Friday, 27th February (Old Hat’s third birthday party!) at Jamboree in Limehouse. Doors at 8pm.
Tickets: http://www.wegottickets.com/event/304507
Be sure to watch their pre-launch YouTube at the foot of this post.
Band Leader Lizy on Drums
Mike Soper
Ewan Bleach
Will Scott
Louis Thomas
Old Hat Jazz Band are:
Adam Tyas (trombone), Ewan Bleach (clarinet, sax), James Kitchman (guitar), Joe Webb (piano), Lizy Exell (drums), Louis Thomas (bass), Mike Soper (trumpet), Simon Marsh (clarinet/sax),
Will Scott (clarinet).
To help you get into the swing with Old Hat Jazz Band, here is their pre-launch YouTube:
Website: http://www.oldhatjazz.co.uk/
Facebook: facebook.com/oldhatjazzband
Twitter: twitter.com/oldhatjazzband
(With exception of Ewan Bleach, Photos by Laurence Cumming © Peter M Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
Mellow Baku (Photo: Terry Adams)
Rachel Johnson
Vasilis Xenopoulos (Photo: Miyuki Tanaka}
https://www.facebook.com/rachaeljohnsonjazz
http://mellowbaku.com
Olney Jazz Club presented The Frank Griffith Quintet on Tuesday, 6th January. An enchanting little number, “The Kerry Dancers”, in particular captured my attention.
Photo & YouTube © Peter M Butler, Jazz&Jazz
Along with Enfield, Hatfield, Potters Bar and Welwyn Garden City, and recently I was told,
St Albans, back in the 1950s/60s Hertfordshire was a hotbed of jazz. Potters Bar was home to greats such as Acker Bilk, Terry Lightfoot and Kenny Ball. Chris Barber was even born in Welwyn Garden City.
When I moved from Hertfordshire back in August, 2013, Welwyn Garden City’s Peartree Jazz Club was still striving to carry on the tradition. But now even The Peartree is no longer a venue as the club has relocated in Lemsford Village Hall, renamed The Lemsford Jazz Club, restoring a more recent tradition of jazz in The Long & The Short Arm public house.
Bob Thomas, trumpet, Tim Curtis, sousaphone, and Gordon Rushden, trombone, at a gig at The Long Arm & Short Arm in Lemsford, Hertfordshire. (Photo © Peter M Butler, Jazz&Jazz)
So when we moved from Lemsford Village in 2013 I wondered where I would find jazz in and around Bedfordshire, our new county. I need not have worried because I soon discovered I had moved pretty well central to a “new era” emerging hotbed of jazz, covering a zone from Hitchin, Luton, Bedford itself, to Olney in Buckinghamshire and Blisworth and Wellingborough in Northamptonshire.
Chris Pearce’s Frenchmen Street Band (Photo © Peter M Butler, Jazz&Jazz).
First, the fact that as a youngster Chris Pearce lived in Welwyn Garden City and from his school he could see Lemsford Village from his school playground – even the home we moved from.
Second, because Chris and his Frenchman Street Band, based in Gloucestershire, star regularly at The Walnut Tree Jazz Club, Blisworth, Northants.
Third, because for Jazz&Jazz to feature as many jazz bands as possible without a crippling outlay for long journeys nationwide, I need top rate venues within striking distance of home. Tad Newton runs such venues at The Walnut Tree, Blisworth and The Castle, Wellingborough, in Northants, and at The Bedford Golf Club (even closer to home).
Fourth, because Alan Haughton, his colleague and pianist in his band, “Tad Newton’s Jazz Friends”, runs Olney Jazz Club in Buckinghamshire, also within easy striking distance. All four are thriving clubs and I count Tad and Alan among my “jazz hero” friends.
Therefore I feature them regularly on Jazz&Jazz, not because I favour them above other clubs and venues, but because due to them I can feature a huge range of jazz bands and musicians on Jazz&Jazz.
Dave Keech Leads a Jazz Quintet based in Hitchin, Herts.
Web: Tad Newton’s Jazz Friends
email – [email protected]
Tel: 01604 858549
email – [email protected]
Tel: 01234 711348
RIDER
Ian Brameld posted on my Facebook Jazzers Group that I failed to mention Hertfordshire’s Pumphouse Jazz Club in Watford. Even though The Pump House is slightly outside the area under consideration, I apologise because it is a long established, thriving club.
Web: Pumphouse Jazz Club
