Tired out at the Red Lion, Isleworth.

I must admit I'm fairly stressed out at the moment - still trying to organise our wedding (or at least watching Robyn do it!) with only two weeks to go.

We were able to get to The Red Lion, Isleworth for some Jazz but I was tired out.

Here are Quentin Collins on trumpet, and Nick Weldon very expressive on bass;

I really enjoy Dave O'Higgins on sax as well as Leon greening on keyboards who was hiding like Trevor Tomkins on drums.

The Music was great - 'Hackensack' by Thelonious Monk, for example, is always a favourite of mine and Robyn won a CD in the raffle.

But boy was I tired!

Neil Harris
(a don't stop till you drop production)
Home: helpmesortoutstpeters.blogspot.com
Contact me: neilwithpromisestokeep@gmail.com

Taking a chance on a Monday night.

I'm still ill but we decided to go to our Jazz club anyway.

It may not be sensible (it's getting colder) but it's therapy, in a way.

We aren't having a great week - the TV broke. It's a huge and heavy old fashioned monster of a set and we've no idea how we are going to get rid of it.

It's just sitting there, looking hurt, watching us instead.

It's very unfair, it only needed to last a bit longer. So at the moment I'm sulking and watching a tiny old portable.

I think my laptop has a bigger screen.

Even the pub where we go to see Jazz is under threat from developers. It means a lot to us; it's where we met.

For me there have been whole periods when I've had to fight to get there, to snatch a short while away from caring from my Mum or struggling in when I've been ill.

Always an achievement to get there.

Once again, it only needs to keep going a bit longer!

Last night was fabulous, a great quintet.

Trevor Tomkins on drums was backed up by Alec Dankworth on bass - I wasn't agile enough to catch them.

This is Quentin Collins on trumpet and Dave O'Higgins on sax, both in full flight;

Meanwhile Robyn was getting fed up with me because I always fail to get a picture of Leon Greening who plays tends to hide, hunched over the keyboard in a corner.

He's one of our favourite keyboard players so she borrowed my camera for this shot as I'd given up;

 

 

Leon has his own band and we keep promising ourselves we'll catch him in the limelight.

 

Meanwhile, we spent an evening enjoying some of the finest sounds of Modern Jazz - Ronnie Scotts regulars at pub prices!

 

Neil Harris

(a don't stop till you drop production)

 

home: helpmesortoutstpeters.blogspot.com

 

Contact me, go on why don't you;

 

neilwithpromisestokeep@gmail.com

 

 

Back at the Red Lion.

We made it again!

Last week was the first time we got back to my Jazz club after I got ill....we made it back again.

And it was good; Quentin Collins was electrifying on the trumpet and Dave O'Higgins is one of my favourite saxophonists. It is fair to say that I do have a number of favourite saxophonists.

 

 

 

They pl;ayed a couple of my favourites too; Thelonius Monk's 'Hackensack' and Horace Silver's 'Barbara'.

 

 

These nights are booked by Trevor Tomkins (drums) and on bass was Dave Green, keyboards John Horler.

 

 

The best in British modern jazz.

 

Neil Harris

(a don't stop till you drop production)

 

 

Home:   helpmesortoutstpeters.blogspot.com

 

Contact me:  neilwithpromisestokeep@gmail.com

 





That's Jazz.

Monday night, what better way to forget about a bad day coming up than to be enjoying the company of Martin Shaw playing his trumpet here with a mute (love that) and Dave O'Higgins on Saxophone at my Jazz Club at The Red Lion down in Isleworth.

 

There in the back row is Nick Weldon taking the bass somewhere extreme while this is the exceptional Leon Greening on keyboards.

 

I had to stretch to get this shot - it's at the start of the evening but as the night goes on he gets more and more hunched over the keys until there's a point when his hair and the ivory meets.

 

And that's Jazz.

 

 

 



You are just missing a shot of the great Trevor Tomkins on drums but I am going to do a special on him later!

Neil Harris
(a don't stop till you drop production)

Home: helpmesortoutstpeters.blogspot.com
contact me: neilwithpromisestokeep@gmail.com

Goodbye Pork Pie Hat.

Monday was the luckiest day – I spent the morning with my Tory dentist – we argue all the time although he usually gets the last word – because he’s got my mouth full of equipment.

Afterwards I spent a while in Hounslow. I never get to go there anymore, which is sad.  I used to work there and lived just up the road.

It’s a wonderful, vibrant Asian town. Full of life and hope. I wrote a Blog about the film ‘Bend it like Beckham’ last year – it was made locally and captures all of that feeling.

 I ended up looking at hats. Its spring, my hats were starting to look as sad and old as I do. I needed a change.

I bought two – big money proper new hats. Not from charity shops, not from discounters.

How about this for a hat:

 

That’s a real Pork Pie Hat, that hat.

It does mean that I could now have Charlie Mingus’s ‘Goodbye Pork Pie Hat’ played at my funeral, except it’s not my favourite tune. Written to say goodbye to Lester Young, it does have a bit of class to it.

As does my new hat – I bought it for chemotherapy but then, when it came time for me to go to my Jazz Club I couldn’t resist wearing it.

 

That's Dave O'Higgins on Sax with Dave Green on bass.

In a world of Jazz Hats I have to say that mine was the coolest.

 

It's that cool. 

I said it was the luckiest day – it was. I phoned Impact Tours in the afternoon and they confirmed I have a booking for Saturday.

I AM GOING TO FRANCE!

A day trip to St. Omer!

The blog is going international!

Ever since I got ill, the one thing I dreamt of, the one thing I couldn’t do was to travel. This Saturday, I get a day in La Belle France. I can’t believe it.

If anyone can think of anything to do in St Omer I would like to hear from you.

As far as I know it’s an industrial town in Le Pas de Calais and its only claim to be a tourist attraction is that when you go to France to buy cheap lager – that’s where they make the cheap lager.

Mind you, there are worse things I could do than drink lager.

Wish me luck – it will be a long, long coach trip.

I am so excited.

(roadtrip)

Neil Harris

(a don’t stop till you drop production)

A not bad Monday night.

Monday night and I struggled off to my Jazz Club at The Red Lion, Isleworth and the celebrations for its third birthday. It was time to take my thrombosis out for the night.

To mark the occasion they had a sextet – that’s two more than I would want but then I’m in a minority of one on that.

Also I had to swallow all my prejudices as the excellent Mark Nightingale was playing his trombone – not one of my favourite modern jazz instruments.

 

 Dave O’Higgins plays a fine saxophone and duetted well with Quentin Collins on trumpet and flugelhorn. Trevor Tomkins drums and Tim Wells on bass made up the line-up except for a late substitution pianist whose name I’m afraid I didn’t catch.

Six musicians are frankly hard to fit into the cupboard that is the Red Lion stage but on several numbers they took full advantage of Mark Nightingale’s arrangements to revel in a big band sound from a small ensemble.

 

For the real Big Band sound, The Riverside is hosting an 18 piece Big band in a fortnight – more on that nearer the time. It’s a sound that isn’t heard these days – you need a lot of money or a wealthy sponsor to play that kind of music. Famously, Charlie Watts the Rolling Stones drummer fritters away his earnings to support his Big band and the BBC can afford to do the same every once in a while.

With The Riverside, the band is being charitable to us as I suspect their fee would barely cover the travel expenses for 18.

It’s going to be a good night and I’ll be plugging it!

Neil Harris

(a don’t stop till you drop production)

Casual it wasn't.

I’ve had a few bad days being not so well, as I said yesterday I’m a grumblin’ an a grouchy.

Also this Blog has got behind itself by a day and I can’t seem to get it straight, like getting the buttons on your shirt done up out of order.

Then again I’ve got a couple of (I hope) adventures* planned for this week although I don’t think I’ll be able to do both. At the moment I’m hoping to be well enough to nail one of them.

I’ll keep you posted.

Monday I hit the jazz trail, or perhaps it hit me.

I warned you, I’m being a grouch.

At the Red Lion, Isleworth, it was an odd set. Five fine players, a couple of hours of good music but to me it seemed as though I was only enjoying every other number. Then again 50% ain’t bad.

This is Tim Wells twackin’ the double bass.

 

 And this is Dave O’Higgins on Sax – a really fine musician.

 

 

‘Hackensack’ by Thelonious Monk was as good as ever, who doesn’t like that?

Steve Waterman woke me up with an outrageous, screaming trumpet while John Horler was doing a very reasonable Monk impression with just one hand, a sharp minimalism that looked so casual that you knew it wasn’t. It got the crowd cheering and my neighbour playing ‘air piano’ for the second week running.

The last number was a special version of ‘It ain’t necessarily so’, the instruments fighting it out amongst themselves.

* One of them involves time travel!

 

Neil Harris

(a don’t stop till you drop production)