Birmingham Town Hall - the UK's answer to The Cotton Club

[Serial_Apologist]

Sat 11 Aug
4pm - Jazz Record Requests
Alyn Shipton with listeners' requests across the full spectrum of jazz, today including tracks from The Cosmic Scene - the 1958 release by Duke Ellington's small group the Spacemen.

http://www.alynshipton.co.uk/blog

5pm - J to Z
Kevin Le Gendre celebrates old and new jazz, today featuring London-born singer and lyricist Norma Winstone. Plus tracks that have inspired New York pianist Fred Hersch.

Norma was in fact born and brought up in Dagenham, as had been Dudley Moore, who was at the same school - they don't make 'em as good there any more. She has collaborated and recorded with Fred Hersch, in case this is not mentioned in the programme.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0bf8n78

12midnight - Geoffrey Smith's Jazz
Geoffrey Smith showcases Both Directions at Once - the recently discovered lost album which saxophonist John Coltrane recorded in March 1963, the day before recording his now-classic duo album with singer Johnny Hartman.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0bf1hsd

Mon 13 Aug
11pm - Jazz Now
Soweto Kinch presents A Change is Gonna Come - a programme of music celebrating human rights, named after Sam Cooke's 1964 song, curated by American singer Carleen Anderson, and recorded earlier this year in Birmingham Town Hall. With vocals from Anderson and lyrics by rapper Speech Debelle, the band also includes rising saxophone star Nubya Garcia, pianist Nikki Yeoh, bassist Renell Shaw and drummer Rod Youngs. And Soweto meets veteran composer, arranger and bandleader Mike Gibbs.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0bf1wx5

Tues 14 Aug
10pm - King Kong - the Township Jazz Musical
Soweto Kinch tells the story of King Kong - a musical collaboration between black and white people that took place in apartheid-torn South Africa and was inspired by the life and tragic death of heavyweight-boxing champion Ezekiel Diamini (1921-57). First broadcast February 2017.

I went to one of the performances of this remarkable show when it came to London. Several of the participants went on to make The Smoke their home, though they never attained the prominence of Louis Moholo and the other Blue Notes on the domestic scene: pianist/composer Joonas Gwangwa ("Cry Freedom"), flautist Robert Sithole, Model/singer Princes Patience*, trombonist Churchill Jolobe and singer Sonti Mdelebe being featured in a heartrending 1988 British documentary "South African Blues", pre-post-apartheid (obviously), talking about exile. Jolobe's band performed at the mega Mandela gathering at Wembley in April 1990.

*I was later shocked to read that Princess Patience had been murdered, though I have never been able to find the story behind this.

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

"....eventually deciding to join Cyril Davies' (Blues) camp in January 1963. Around this time, Davies also added female backing singers to the lineup in the form of South African vocal group the Velvettes (not to be confused with Motown trio, the Velvelettes), who had emigrated to England after touring with the musical stage production King Kong. This group was a trio made up of Hazel Futa, (PRINCESS) Patience Gcwabe and Eunice Mamsie Mthombeni after their fourth member, Peggy Phango, had left to pursue a solo career."

She, Patience, was also in a couple of films, Leo the Last (1970) and Mogul (1965). After that...?

BN.

[Ian Thumwood]

The opening track on JRR is by Fletcher Henderson but the arrangement is by Will Hudson. I must admit to being fascinated by this writer because he was born in Canada but thrgh his associations with Irving Mills ending up writing charts for most of the black bands of the time including McKinney's Cotton pickers, Jimmie Lunceford, Lucky Millinder / MBRB, Don Redman and Earl Hines. There aren't too many white arrangers who were employed by the great black orchestras of the day and this makes Hudson pretty interesting in my book. In addition, he also penned some quite well known compositions such as "Moonglow."

Even before he had joined Glenn Miller's USAAF orchestra he had made a recording where Serge Chaloff made his debut. The same band included Ralph Burns. Not familiar with his own bands which had limited success in the 1930's...

[Serial_Apologist]

Mon 13 Aug
11pm - Jazz Now
Soweto Kinch presents A Change is Gonna Come - a programme of music celebrating human rights, named after Sam Cooke's 1964 song, curated by American singer Carleen Anderson, and recorded earlier this year in Birmingham Town Hall. With vocals from Anderson and lyrics by rapper Speech Debelle, the band also includes rising saxophone star Nubya Garcia, pianist Nikki Yeoh, bassist Renell Shaw and drummer Rod Youngs. And Soweto meets veteran composer, arranger and bandleader Mike Gibbs.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0bf1wx5

Well I have to say I found this all pretty cringeworthy, with vapid music and simpering introductions that were more appropriate to this week's Sunday Worship, from the [sic] "Keswick Convention, on the theme of Shining like Stars" than crying out for human rights. If Jeremy is dependent on cultural backing from the youth sector for what is to come he will have to find it elsewhere than here, or be laughed out of court. So it was salutary, with the re-broadcast of the programme below, which I missed first time around, to be reminded of a time when the music really did measure up to the demands of a situation:

Tues 14 Aug
10pm - King Kong - the Township Jazz Musical
Soweto Kinch tells the story of King Kong - a musical collaboration between black and white people that took place in apartheid-torn South Africa and was inspired by the life and tragic death of heavyweight-boxing champion Ezekiel Diamini (1921-57). First broadcast February 2017.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

That "King Kong" documentary was superb.