It’s always a great pleasure to hear the music of major American jazz stars, and Norway’s Kongsberg Jazz Festival certainly featured a strong contingent, including guitarist John Scofield, organist John Medeski,,drummer Joey Baron and trumpeter Dave Douglas. There was a [...]
Can children as young as seven dig jazz? The Cheltenham Jazz Festival project Jazz Music For Schools proved that they definitely can. With a band named the Happy Vampers, and a sharply-focussed programme that engaged 1,400 children age seven to [...]
It’s rare to hear vocal groups at jazz festivals these days, so I was delighted to meet up with members of Flight Call when they appeared at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival. The trio of singers – Pete Horsfall, Lucy-Anne Daniels [...]
The glorious waves of the music furiously swirled and crashed around me, stirring all my senses and sending my spirits soaring. I thought: “This must be what white water rafting is like.” The Double Quartet of saxophonist and composer Paul [...]
Soft Machine evolved from its roots as a pioneering 1960s psychedelic progressive band into an outstanding jazz quartet underpinned by powerful rock-solid rhythms. But from the opening moments of the current group’s concert in Lichfield, the early days of the [...]
Pianist and composer Steve Tromans has long been a cornerstone artist on the Birmingham jazz scene, and has also travelled widely as a musician and educator. And sitarist Jonathan Mayer – son of Indo Jazz Fusions founder John Mayer – [...]
The group Freight Train, originally formed with Irish folk singer Cathy Jordan, drummer Paul Clarvis and pianist Liam Noble is a successful project blending jazz and folk music. Because of conflicting commitments, Jordan was unable to play three West Midland [...]
A dreadful tragedy cut short the Pancevo Jazz Festival, held in a town north of Belgrade, Serbia. Three days of national mourning were declared in the region after a concrete canopy collapsed at a railway station in the city of [...]
The Belgrade Jazz Festival always offers a strong international line-up – from legendary performers to often astonishing rising stars – and despite financial constraints its 40th birthday programme produced a great deal of truly magnificent music. It opened at the [...]
Writer/ photographer John Watson heard and saw Dennis Rollin’s as special guest with the Nick Dewhurst Band at the Cathedral Hotel on Friday 7 June as part of the Lichfield Jazz and Blues Festival. Photos copyright John Watson/jazzcamera.co.uk John Watson [...]
