Any Jazz fans left in Sheffield?

[pensionipper 11]

Texas: could the jatp City Hall concert have included Coleman Hawkins, along with Diz, Oscar and other top artists? I was there.

 

As for Ted Heath I saw him there - the band, Dickie Valentine, Dennis Lotis and Lita Rosa (who put a lipstick impression on my white shirt and although I warned my Mum never to wash it - she did, the day after).

I also went with my dad to see Stan Kenton there whose band, in spite of not having the top names we expected ( all forming their own bands then)

absolutely blew my brain.

Did you know that Maynard Ferguson (who could hit notes that only dogs could hear, almost) lived in Sheffield for a while, some years, I believe.

Oscar Peterson made many recordings of 'Tenderly' but one, recorded at a concert, stands out from the rest. Do you know the one I mean?

What a cracking thread! Thanks to ALL for the memories.

[Timbuck 10]

In the 1950's I used to go to a Youth Club at St Christophers Church on Bellhouse Road some of the older lads there used to play a lot of Trad Jazz records..I didn't like that kind of music...untill one night I heard a record that was different, everyone was standing around the record player snapping their fingers and singing out the words..I asked what it was..and was told it was the Chris Barber Skiffle Group and the song was Rock Island Line...Skiffle was the the music for me...later I was to form my own Skiffle Group and my music career had begun...Still don't like Trad Jazz tho.

[buck 11]

I seem to remember there was a Sheffield jazz club in the fifties that was considered the biggest in UK. It was trad, while most of my cohorts and I were modern jazz fans. We were called boppers, dressed in drapejackets, peg top pants and crepe soled shoes. We used to bus out to the Astoria in Nottingham on Sunday nights, when everything in Sheffield was shut down. Used to smoke king sized Pall Malls form the American airmen at the USAF base nearby.

[Texas 10]

The other trumpet player at the City Hall JATP concert was Roy Eldridge, and yes, Coleman Hawkins was there too. Who was the other tenor? Amazing how the memory goes, it wasn't Stan Getz was it?

I consider myself privileged to have seen musicians of that stature. One thing for sure, you're not going to see their like again.

And Buck, you and me must've been on the same 'bus. I went on a couple of visits to the Astoria in Nottingham. Apart from everything else you could jive there. The 'everything else' was coming back on the coach and shouldn't have been allowed.

[buck 11]

The other trumpet player at the City Hall JATP concert was Roy Eldridge, and yes, Coleman Hawkins was there too. Who was the other tenor? Amazing how the memory goes, it wasn't Stan Getz was it?

I consider myself privileged to have seen musicians of that stature. One thing for sure, you're not going to see their like again.

And Buck, you and me must've been on the same 'bus. I went on a couple of visits to the Astoria in Nottingham. Apart from everything else you could jive there. The 'everything else' was coming back on the coach and shouldn't have been allowed.

The Astoria was fantastic, and the girls gorgeous. I was and still am a big fan of Stan Getz and have just about everything he ever did. I missed JATP because the navy had other plans for me. I got lucky for a while and was stationed near Warrington Lancs for about a year. That gave me almost every weekend at home.Great music, Miles Davis, Gerry Mulligan, Coltrane. What talent!!

[Highnote 10]

Thanks for all the memories which brought back many of mine of the wonderful jazz musicians we were privileged to to see, and of course hear.

A little story about the Basie Band,(the greatest big band I ever saw,and I saw a few)when they played their first UK tour the band parts did not arrive in this country so they played the whole"book" throughout the tour from memory!

Another everlasting memory was of a concert given by the wonderful Carmen Macrae, and during the programme announcing the next number she said"now I'd like to"--and as quick as a flash a male voice from the audience shouted"Yes I'd like to an'all!!"the audience erupted in laughter, and Carmen Macrae just stood there helpless with laughter, and applauded her anonymous admirer,and for those of you who did not know Carman Macrae, she was a very beautiful and curvacious negress.

Can anyone remember Ella Fitzgerald having trouble with the spotlight on her?and ad-libbing words asking to to turn it off to the tune she was singing.

The great Ted Heath and all the wonderful sidemen he had over the years, and another great favourite of mine,and still is, Stephan Grappelli,could that man swing?blew your mind.Some years ago he played a concert at the Crucible, and my fellow jazz mate could not go, so my Wife, who is not the least bit interested in jazz said she would go and keep me company, and sat there absolutely enthralled the whole concert.

So please,please keep those memories coming, I am sure there are many more, I have thousands.

[buck 11]

There was a time in the early fifties when the Musicians Union banned American bands from playing in the UK. We had to take a trip to Dublin to see Stan Kenton, and many bands played there. Over here I've been priveleged to see Cleo Laine and Johnny Dankworth in concert with Mel Torme, and also Mel Torme with George Shearing. I should have seen Sarah Vaughn in Hartford Connecticut but she failed to show because she was drunk. She died not long after. I saw Sinatra in Montreal and just recently the incredible Tony Bennet at the University of Connecticut. I don't like a lot of contempory Jazz, although I'm a big fan of Diana Krall and Dianne Reeve, and can take some Marsalis, but not all.

[buck 11]

Does anybody remember Vic Lewis and his band? they did everything Stan Kenton did, though not as good. I was seventeen and took a girl from work to his concert at the City Hall. Afterwards she insisted on trying to talk to the sidemen after the concert. They cottoned on to her cos she was kind of gorgeous, so we were invited to join them for supper at I think the Norton Arms. They were a great bunch of guys.

[Highnote 10]

Yes I remember the Vic Lewis Band, a real powerhouse unit, as you say styled in the Stan Kenton idiom,and among the line-up were such stalwarts as Jimmy Skidmore t/sax,Kathy Stobart t/sax,Bert Courtley tpt,Johnny Shakespeare tpt,Ronnie Chamberlain a/sax(lured away by Ted Heath), and a talented arranger Ken Thorne,when I was doing my National Service 1948 time we saw the Oscar Rabin band at a concert in Bath, and he had a woncerful trumpet player called Bobby Benstead, and I think he played in a Vic Lewis band at some time, I remember that concert very well as there were no trains back to camp so me and a mate had to walk,about four miles!.

The Vic Lewis band suffered from the problem of all big bands,finance.

Another great band which came and went was the wonderful Tommy Sampson band from Scotland, with Henry Mackenzie,Duncan Campbell,I only saw them once,I think Ron Simmonds was in the trumpet section for a time.

[sweetdexter 10]

Thanks for all the memories which brought back many of mine of the wonderful jazz musicians we were privileged to to see, and of course hear.

A little story about the Basie Band,(the greatest big band I ever saw,and I saw a few)when they played their first UK tour the band parts did not arrive in this country so they played the whole"book" throughout the tour from memory!

Another everlasting memory was of a concert given by the wonderful Carmen Macrae, and during the programme announcing the next number she said"now I'd like to"--and as quick as a flash a male voice from the audience shouted"Yes I'd like to an'all!!"the audience erupted in laughter, and Carmen Macrae just stood there helpless with laughter, and applauded her anonymous admirer,and for those of you who did not know Carman Macrae, she was a very beautiful and curvacious negress.

Can anyone remember Ella Fitzgerald having trouble with the spotlight on her?and ad-libbing words asking to to turn it off to the tune she was singing.

The great Ted Heath and all the wonderful sidemen he had over the years, and another great favourite of mine,and still is, Stephan Grappelli,could that man swing?blew your mind.Some years ago he played a concert at the Crucible, and my fellow jazz mate could not go, so my Wife, who is not the least bit interested in jazz said she would go and keep me company, and sat there absolutely enthralled the whole concert.

So please,please keep those memories coming, I am sure there are many more, I have thousands.

 

I wish I could have gotten to see Carmen live.

I have a VHS tape of her at the Montreal Jazz Festival, doing a lot of Monk tunes.

Still my favourite female vocalist

[Texas 10]

Tommy Sampson, a legend among aficianados (or a leg end, depending on your sense of humor). Half of Tommy Sampson's band was nicked by Ted Heath, or so I've been led to believe.

How about the Ray Ellington group? It seemed that every concert at the City, featuring the more traditional sort of jazz, the support band was Ray Ellington, keeping up the end for bebop.

I'm no purist at all, I love all kinds of the music, and I loved his act. For sheer entertainment he was hard to beat. The musicians in his band, Dick Katz, Coleridge Goode, I forget the guitarist's name, all top class. I believe that Coleridge Goode pioneered the amplification of the bass back in the 40's and I think he's still around.

I remember one time, me and a mate got talking to Ray Ellington in the corridor backstage, he was very approachable. Could've been though because he was interested in my mates sister.

I didn't like the tension on his bass drum though. Actually, I nearly told him that, but he was a hell of a lot bigger than I was.

[PopT 10]

Do you remember Jimmy Rushing appearing at the City Hall, he was in good form.

 

Over here in NZ I was fortunate to buy a cd of him singing with the Dave Brubeck outfit and it is a great listen.

 

Can you remember the Dave Brubeck outfit with the incredible Paul Desmond on Alto.

 

Please keep this post going,it's so nostalgic of a time when you could really hear some innovative music played by such talented musicians.

 

Happy Days!