Summer Time Swing

As the UK is currently experiencing an unseasonably warm May, here is a playlist of Summer themed jazz, compiled by yours truly, to chill out to in the heat. 

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/75NCTzmwUnnJjeVwYOpiqR?si=d4db5c80b332471c

Rollins at Jazz Club 90

 Beginning my look back at the life and work of the late Sonny Rollins here with a look at how some of his music has fed into different corners of the Jazz world.

While Sonny Rollins was undoubtedly a modern player, a number of his compositions have made their way into the British Trad scene, and none more so often than the calypso based "St. Thomas."

Here is a recording from Jazz Club 90 on 18th May 2008 of the Millennium Eagle Jazz Band playing "St. Thomas." Note a young Jack Cotterill on drums.

This was a golden age for Jazz Club 90, it was based at the Harp in Albrighton- a proper old-fashioned "wipe your feet on the way out" style Pub. The beer was great as was the music.

Jazz Club 90 was predominantly a hard Trad/Dixieland Club, so it was quite a surprise everytime a modern number would turn up in the set lists.  

Judging by the dates, it is very likely yours-truly was in the audience, sampling the best part of a tidy-few of the draught beers.

A Sad Day in Harlem

 As the pleasant abnormally- warm-for-May weather took hold of the day this morning, a notification from a Jazzwise social media cast a small shadow on the day. It was the news that Walter Theodore "Sonny" Rollins had passed away, aged 95, on 25th May at his home.

Aside from the obvious loss of another legend, this is a particularly sad passing as it means that every musician featured in the famous "Great Day in Harlem" photo has passed away, and that last of the great Modern Tenors has joined his colleagues in that jam session in the Sky. 

Thinking back on my own journey into Jazz, I am fairly confident that Rollins was likely the first of the modern Tenors I heard. This would have been through a compilation marketed at the casual listener and novice called "The Only Jazz Album You Will Ever Need." This was not a bit intro for a newbie as it featured tracks by many of the big names including Louis Armstrong, Paul Desmond, Brubeck (post-Desmond), Miles, Oscar Peterson, Django Reinhardt, and of course Sonny. The track chosen was "God Bless the Child," and while now, as a 40something with much Jazz digested, I recognise it as a fantastic piece. Wet-behind-the-ears me had different ideas and it took me a while to warm to Rollins overall. 

Over the next couple of weeks I will be delving into the Rollins catalogue and offering my two cents on them.

Afterword on the Upton Jazz Festival 2012

 Looking back on my diary of the Upton Jazz Festival bought forward a big inrush of memories that had been previously tucked away, a lot of smiles, and as often is the case with these things, the reminder of the less than pleasant aspects of my life at the time, meaning that my Jazz diary is a solid reminder of one of the last times I was actually happy in 2012.

It also reflects a bit of a snapshot of not only the history of the festival, but a point in time for the town of Upton itself, with shops mentioned in my diary (such as the bookshop) long since having disappeared. What is perhaps a good sign is that all of the Pubs mentioned in the diary were still going as of my last visit to Upton in 2025, a successful feat and once which spits in the face of the doom & gloom narrative that is being presented in the press and picked upon by every possible commentator going presently, (who happily ignore that the same stories have been coming back and forth for nearly two decades at least). That is another story, and one which I may discuss elsewhere, but not in the Jazzocracy. 

The festival has of course changed, and 2012 was perhaps the last one done on that scale, though the marquee set up would continue on up until the end of the decade, but I think the disruption of the bad weather and the subsequent changes in venue broke the bubble that the festival was in, and the community who visited never quite adapted to the new locations. 

Looking at the bands, the selection and range was very good and the large marquee's allowed for more larger bands and a greater audience capacity plus room for the dancers, and allowed, despite the boggy conditions much more fluid of movement between venues. 

The diary itself, well as presented her, edits have been made for various reasons. Partially to go with context, with jokes which when being presented as part of an ongoing blog by a twentysomething land perfectly well, but 14 years later, standing along and presented by a guy in his early 40's, the context and is gone, and the jokes and references would read quite differently- or just not make sense. I have tried to smooth the transitions from these cuts as best I could, but there is only so much papering you can do to hide cracks. The other thing I did notice, and stands out quite a bit now,  is my word- I didn't half drink a lot of beer over the course of the festival, I doubt I could drink half as much as that now and still be standing! It was nice however, to revisit some of the breweries of the time, I really ought to look up and see which ones are still going now. That was a bit of a golden age for independent breweries and I was always on the look out for new brews to stock at the Pub I worked in at the time as over the course of a few years our ale trade turnover had at least tripled, though the date reminded me that the writing was on the wall for my pub to be stocking ales from independent breweries.

It is easy to get lost in the rush of nostalgia and the rose tinted glasses, and turn around and say "the current situation is crap, it was so much better back then," but time has moved on, the world has changed, people have changed- I would rather not think about what percentage of the patrons from 2012 have seen passed away, so it would be unfair to judge on that bias.  Change is inevitable, and post-covid, getting people back has proved to be quite difficult across the board. Yes, I miss the under the bridge venue, but a appreciate it must have been a logistical nightmare, and suspect regulations on stewarding have tightened up over the years.

So, the 2026 Upton Jazz Festival is a month and a half away, am I looking forward to it? Hell, yeah... I am expected a different vibe. Also yes, but different doesn't necessarily equate to bad.

Keep an eye out for my forthcoming write ups of the 2025 Upton Jazz Festival, and the 2025 Bude Jazz Festival.

Until then, keep Jazzing!

 2026