Good Morning jazz fans. Another week, another blog, and the blogger is another year older too!!
Yes I have survived another year, but sadly not without attending to more than one funeral.
That make it imperative that opportunities are taken to enjoy live jazz, to add to the store of great memories I have for jazz sessions that are still alive in my memory.
My pictures of last week session with “our” Lester Brown alongside saxophonist Frank Walden are below.
It’s amazing how memories can be jogged by photos. One of the features of the past few days has been the passing down to me of family photos. I have now gained a whole lot of photos of family from the 1890’s. This of course comes with an added sadness that I no longer have anyone to tell me who they were! But they were my ancestors, and some of those photos possibly predate jazz itself!
One of the actual objects that I have recently inherited is a coach horn dating from 1862 that I had completely lost track of. When I first started to listen to jazz on 78 rpm records, I used to blow the horn in time with the music, leading me to eventually buying a trumpet. Now a trumpet is really only a metal pipe with extra plumbing with valve access. I’m sure Lester wouldn’t think of his trumpet in that way at all!
Coming to us at Hedsor Jazz this week we have “our” Mike Wills on reeds with trumpeter Gary Wood. I don’t think Gary has been to Hedsor before, and I’m assured he is good, so please make your way to Hedsor for a memorable evening.
For some months now we have had the room we play in at The Hedsor Bar laid out by one of Hedsor Bar’ staff so that the music is played down the room and not across it from the stage. This means of course that PA, tables and chairs have to be arranged like that and rearranged back at the end of every Thursday session. This week John has had a cataract operation and cant do that for us, so please be a boy scout (i.e. “be prepared”) to give a hand at both ends of the evening. No, you wont get a discount, but you will get a big thank you, and maybe if we ask you nicely you will do it for us again until John if fit to resume.
We have plans for Hedsor, below you will see what they are for September.
But we are now booking ahead into October and November, so fish out your diary and make note that on October 19th we will have a return of trombonist Nick Mills with trumpeter Ed Benstead. Even further ahead in November we will have saxophonist Karen Sharp with us at Hedsor together with trumpeter Stuart Henderson. Wow! That’s on November 23rd
That’s it for now folks, but below is a picture of my great grandmother with an unknown male!!! That is my father's mothers mother! Without her there would be no blog!
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1 comment:
Hi Geoff - good to see you have now made your family connections, something which is not always easy with people of a certain generation. I was very fortunate indeed in that I knew my great-grandmother from my mother's side of the family. I was about twelve when she passed away at the age of 96. She was a Cornish lady from Wadebridge but she had lived in London for over 80 years. Her dress style and general demeanour always put me in mind of Queen Victoria, to whom she bore a startling resemblance. One of her grandsons (and therefore my uncle) is Roy Battersby, the (now retired) TV producer. As there is only 8 years difference in our ages we are more like cousins and I do try and keep in touch even though we are both now in our 80s.
Good to see that you are keeping up the good work with the jazz but I still haven't had a chance to get up for a listen. For my sins, I have been roped in to present a jazz programme once a month on a local community radio station (10 Radio) at Wiveliscombe. It actually goes out every Tuesday night between 8 & 10 and is available via the internet. I try and play a variety of jazz on my show and this Tuesday (14th) I am devoting the programme to the work of Henry 'Red' Allen. With the show going out over the internet we have listeners from across the world and we get Emails from both the U.S.A. and the Antipodes. Keep up the good work. TTFN
p.s. my Email address has changed to alan.bond@talktalk.net
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