Another week, another issue of Geoff’s blog.

This week at Hedsor Jazz we welcome singer Gill Cook alongside guitarist John Coverdale. As you may have read, Gill is a short notice replacement for Alan Grahame, who has again been taken ill with a respiratory problem. Martin is still on tour, as is “our Nigel” so our rhythm section will be Ken McCarthy on keyboard, Terry Davis on bass and Mike Jeffries on drums.

Gill Cook at an Ealing Jazz Festival

Those of us who were at Hedsor last week signed the “get well” card for Alan, so it just leaves me saying here to Alan, “Get Well Soon. I have a feeling we have you booked in for July 11^th, so no pressure then!” Joking aside Alan, all the best for a full recovery.

I would draw your attention to a very special, and somewhat unusual, gig coming to us on June 13th. The award winning guitarist Nigel Price is coming to Hedsor to play with just our rhythm section. This should be a very interesting event, and I have produced a poster for you all to put up somewhere where others will notice it.

An unusual gig? Well Nigel doesn’t do solo gigs very often, he is usually fully employed with his own organ trio, so it is a rare treat to have him come out on his own for us at Hedsor.

Last weeks session with Lester Brown and Duncan Lamont Jnr was another excellent session. They really do work well together. I think it is the first time ever at Hedsor that we have had a bass player sing, but our bass player of the week Terry Davis did, on his feature number, including individually modified lyrics!

Duncan also produced a first. He got the band to read and play (yes, they can do that!) his own composition in homage to Art Blakey of “Jazz Messengers” fame, “Art for Arts Sake”. Duncan pointed out that many famous modern jazz musicians passed through that band. What Duncan didn’t mention was that many who did picked up Art’s drug habit as well!

Pictures from last week below.

Don’t forget to let others know of the tremendous jazz that is available at Hedsor every Thursday. I was talking with bass player Nick Pugh on Saturday and he thinks Hedsor Jazz is the longest running weekly jazz club around in this part of the world. He could be right. Just spread the fame!