Magazine: JAZZ RIFF - November 2011

Greetings fellow jazz musicians, supporters and promoters! Thanks for your comments and feedback on the Jazz Riff column. If you’d like to offer a story or two, or just want to promote any particular jazz gig, event, charity blast or a little nugget of wisdom, then please send it into the team at Grapevine. It’s such a great honour to be covering the jazz in this region and I’m always worried I don’t have enough space to give everyone the recognition and promotion needed to help keep jazz live and kicking!
So my opening number will start, after the count in, with a bold statement that in Harwich, jazz is 100 years old! Only a hundred you say! Here’s the riff: The Electric Palace in Harwich will celebrate their centenary with a special jazz happening on Thursday, November the 17th. The history of the venue is fascinating, as soon after the cinema reopened in 1981, occasional Jazz Concerts were organised by Chris Strachan, who is Chairman of the Trust, which owns the building. The building is renowned for excellent acoustics and good sight-lines.

Highlights in the early years were concerts by the cream of British and visiting American jazz musicians including Ken Colyer, The London Ragtime Orchestra, Sphere with Andy Shepherd, Butch Thompson, Sammy Rimington, Dick Heckstall-Smith’s Overdrive, Bob Kerr and his Whoopee Band, Freddie Lonzo, Barry Martyn, Chris Burke and Les Muscutt from New Orleans, The Young Bloods, Sonny Morris, Colin Bowden and Brian Carrick. After Chris retired from full-time work, the number of concerts increased from one or two a year, to more regular gigs, featuring bands with great names playing great jazz - The Brass Volcanoes, Trevor Watts & Peter Knight, Spike Heatley, Alan Barnes, James Evans, Richard Pite, Keith Nichols, Spats Langham, Red Beans and Rice, John Sutton’s London Rhythm Boys, Hugh Rainey, Red Wing, The Storyville Jass band and Chris’s own band, The Tendring Thunderbirds. The line-up for 100 Years Of Jazz at 8pm is : Richard Pite, Dave Chamberlain, Nick Dawson, Enrico Tomasso, Pete Long and Georgina Jackson. A warm welcome awaits for a night of hot jazz! Expect the best, and look forward to more gigs in the future. Tickets £10 ( + £1 membership) are available now on 07786744789 or go to www.electricpalace.com
With my connections to the National Youth Jazz Orchestra ( of which the above mentioned Mr. Long served his time and has continued his support for NYJO!), I‘m delighted to share many more reasons to celebrate the next 100 years of jazz. This is because Conservatoires UK and the National Youth Jazz Orchestra have signed an historic agreement that will allow students from the eight member conservatoires to gain professional experience and artistic excellence at national level. The collaboration will create a lasting cultural legacy in the education of young jazz players in the United Kingdom, and build on the informal partnerships that already exist between NYJO and the Conservatoires.
 

British Youth Jazz Education is certainly at the forefront of nurturing the next generations of world class musicians. Can I ask you to support any youngsters out there who can’t always afford tickets for your venue, or ask for the opportunity to play, even if it’s in the break between sets? Thanks: there’s nothing like the buzz of a live audience to get experience and instant feedback. There are changes on the horizon for NYJO, as in January 2012, NYJO1 will become a 30-strong “pool” of musicians, from which the senior staff will select 22 players to perform at each gig. A fund will be set up to aid those members who live or study a long way from London. I see this as a great step forward, and we can, and do produce top young jazzers here in East Anglia. Contact me if you would like more information. NYJO, founded in 1965 by Bill Ashton OBE, is partly funded by Arts Council England, with funding via Jazz Services Ltd: oh and just in case you think I was there THAT long ago, you are mistaken…cough cough! ( it was 1979 actually).
Although its further afield, do check out the amazing line-up for the forthcoming London Jazz Festival, from November 11th to the 20th. Too many to recommend, in a wide array of venues, but I like the link with the Electric Palace Centenary celebrations, with a silent film at the Barbican Centre, London on Sunday 13th November, at 3pm, simply called Louis. It tells the story of the great Louis Armstrong, with specially commissioned music written by another legend trumpeter and jazz educator, Wynton Marsalis.

Now that’s a neat link….I thank you!