Almost Jazz from Geoff!!

Another August Bank Holiday gone bye and it was the last bank holiday before Christmas too!!

Yes, it’s that dreaded C word again. But sadly this year has been so altered by Coronavirus 19 that bank holidays don’t seem to be so important this year as so many people have been “distancing” for most of it. Christmas may be the next bright spot on the calendar.

This year most live musical events have just not happened. My usual break for Swanage hasn’t happened as there was no jazz festival, and therefore no visit to friends on Portland, which was always a pleasant bye product of a trip to Dorset.

So perhaps the next thing to look forward to IS Christmas. However I feel Christmas 2020 may not be such a joyous meeting of friends and family as it was in 2019. A Christmas Party? How big is your bubble? Christmas Shopping? Thanks be for Amazon! 

But I do need some more shoes; daily exercise does have side effects!

This week I don’t think there are a lot of jazz items to talk about. There is still plenty of music to catch up with via the internet one way or another (check back on previous blogs for links to what I have already recommended), but the camaraderie of actually meeting people and watching performance, knowing you can go and tell the performer how good they were at the end of the evening just cannot be there at the moment. “Project Fear” was well sown, and with good reason. Now we are all caught in the dilemma of staying free from a virus we can’t see and encouraging our economy back into some form of plus for effects we CAN see! So “rock” and “hard place” come to mind.

It is an irony that most jazz fans now seem to be of pensionable age, and most musicians are of working age and do need to earn a living.

Ian Wallis emailed last week to advise that Maidenheads Norden Farm ARE running a live jazz evening, BUT it may just be a streamed event. DO take a look at

https://norden.farm/events/alan-barnes-saxes-18

and let me know how you get on if you try to book. Again do so by emailing via the octogeoff@outlook.com link please.

Those of you who have read past blogs know that I suffered a flood in my garage a few weeks ago. Sadly I had 2 boxes of jazz LP’s stored waiting delivery to charitable outlets. One box was plastic, the other cardboard. Guess which one was on the floor, yes your right, the cardboard one. I have now spent a number of days separating out the very damp box of LP’s into drying cardboard and drying vinyl. Obviously all of the cardboard sleeves are damaged, but mostly they are still readable but no longer works of art. BUT the LP’s themselves are all OK. They are now dry and clean and flat. So if anyone would like to have them, then they are yours if you come and collect. Contact via octogeoff@outlook.com They are all modern jazz, and there is some wonderful stuff within. Miles Davis, Sarah Vaughn, Weather Report (which could have shouted louder to warn of the impending flood), Stan Kenton etc etc.

There are also some to play along with to enable you to practice your instrument in different keys!

Most jazz album recording dates spread from 1950 to 1980. If you have the turntable, I have the plastic (OK Vinyl). Sample of the damaged artwork below.

Finally!!

I have managed a listen to a couple of CD’s as well as some of the recently washed LP’s this week and one of them has a commonality with the great washed! Having a recording vintage the same as some of the LP’s anyway, one of my earliest Scott Hamilton CD’s (purchased when I attended The Brecon Jazz Festival) is “Tenorshoes”. With Scott on this one, recorded in 1979 with Dave McKenna on piano, Phil Flanigan bass and Jeff Hamilton on drums. It is an excellent reminder of the kind of music we took for granted in the days of old!! Yes, you could talk to these very talented American jazz musicians there too and they in their turn were very pleased to talk to us British jazz fans. The tune list is probably also from days of old too. “The Shadow of Your Smile”, “The Nearness of You”, “My Foolish Heart” all have a fresh sounding Scott playing melodic yet swinging jazz, ably supported by his trio.

Scott was at the 2019 Swanage Jazz Festival, but sadly wasn’t enabled to play at his best by being coupled with a lady pianist/singer who really thought SHE was the star. Back in the day when Swanage Jazz used the Victoria Club, he was able to shine, alongside a lady who has shone for us many times at Hedsor Jazz, Tina May!

Just to prove that Hedsor Jazz has run some wonderful memorable sessions, this one from my collection has Tina May alongside the late Duncan Lamont at our Christmas party in 2017. 

And below is a general view of the band and some of the audience

We WILL RETURN, but until then, STAY SAFE.