As many of you bloggers who live in the Stockton will know, the Stockton International Riverside Festival 09 and the Stockton Fringe Festival 09 recently took place this weekend (July 30th - August 2nd 2009), and I had the great pleasure of playing and being one of two drummers in a newly formed Jazz Group, called "Miles Ahead", in the Georgian Theatre during their free Jazz day on August 2nd.
Me along with seven other Jazz beginners / fanatics of different ages, backgrounds, and experiences from the North East of England, had been taking part in Milestones Workshops held by Adrian Tilbrook of jazzaction, Andy Champion and Noel Dennis (all of whom are some of the best jazz musicians in the North East, if not in England) since late May to late July. There were nine workshops in total (I myself attended seven of them) followed by a performace at the Stockton Fringe Festival 09, in order to show our development and progression in Jazz to a wider audience.
During our performance we played six pieces in total: Footprints, Watermelon Man, You Don't Know What Love Is (Saxophone solo ballard piece), So What, Song for My Father, and Now's The Time.
The performance went down extremely well and I believe we all played brillantly. I hope that there are more Miles Ahead workshops sessions in the future and that this is the start of great things to come :). Following the Fringe Festival I recently came across a short review of our performance from a Jazz Blog called Bebop spoken here, a blog which I have been a fan of for some time. Our performance was well received by Bebop and reads as follows:
"It was asking a lot of the Miles Ahead group to follow Alter Ego and Zoe but they did it brilliantly. A mixture of youth and experience they played some tricky scores expertly and the girl saxes all had good solo spots. The lead alto's feature on "You Don't Know What Love Is" being particularly outstanding. As Noel said, "The future of jazz is in safe hands."If anyone can give me the names I'll carve them here with pride".
http://lance-bebopspokenhere.blogspot.com/2009/08/stockton-jazz-festival-part-one-12-noon.html
I would just like to says thanks to Bebop for writing a lovely review of our preformance which I think is justly deserved.
I would just like to says thanks to Bebop for writing a lovely review of our preformance which I think is justly deserved. Until next time,
Stay Happy :)
Cheeky Lamby
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Thanks, can I be cheeky and call you Lamby?
ReplyDeleteI'll put a link to your comments.
Lance (Bebop Spoken Here.
Hi Cheeky Lamby from the Shearers (Alex & Dad).
ReplyDeleteIt was great working with you and what a great feeling it was playing in front of an appreciative audience at the Georgian, wasn't it ?
We both miss the workshop sessions and it would have been great if the band had been able to stick together and develop further, but that is the only downside amongst all the positives and we would both jump at the chance to learn more from great players like Adrian, Noel, Andy & Mark. And also to experience the enjoyment that goes with bonding with other musicians to form a real band (if only for the one performance).
You're a fine drummer who has been guided by a great drummer (Adrian), and hopefully we will see you and maybe some of the 'Miles Ahead' band again in tne near future.
Good luck at university Katie, and in everything you choose to do in future, and please check out my MySpace page which includes a clip of Miles Ahead performing 'Now Is The Time' featuring your brill drum solo.
http:/vids.myspace.com/andyman
Andy & Alex
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Sorry Katie, The link is: -
ReplyDeletehttp://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=63099197
Andy & Alex
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