We are keeping a diary of the project as we go along so you can get a flavour of what we are up to.
We went to see Elaine Delmar singing at The Crazy Coqs as part of the London Jazz festival. She was performing with two other musicians who were interviewed for this project, Alan Barnes and Dave Green. It was a great concert. We didn't do any filming. We just went for the sheer joy!
We had a packed house for the premiere of our documentary film. We showed the film to an appreciative audience and had an interesting Q&A afterwards with some of the musicians interviewed as well as one of our volunteers. Thanks to everyone who came along and made it such a wonderful evening.
Photos: Matthew Rosenberg from digital-works introducing the evening. Bottom photo of the Q&A, from left to right: Kuljit Bhamra, Henry Lowther, Jennifer Maidman, Skaila Kanga, Lily Lambert and Matthew Rosenberg.
We went and filmed the Phil Dawson Quintet as Rowland Sutherland was playing with them. It was a great evening of music at Pizza Express, Dean Street. Look out for some clips which we will include in the film part of this project. As ever, thanks to the team at Pizza Express for welcoming us and to all of the musicians.
We went along to the Royal Academy to film a wonderful trio made up of students of Skaila Kanga at the Royal Academy. We wanted to include images of young musicians in the film part of the project so look out for this . Thanks to the students for letting us film them.
Henry Lowther and Paul Clarvis are two of the musicians who were interviewed for our project and both are members of the excellent London Jazz Orchestra so we went along to see them and to do some filming of the performance. The orchestra's members compose original music which they perform along with occasional new arrangements of jazz standards. It was a brilliant afternoon. We also managed to film Paul and Henry along with pianist Alcyona Mick playing an impromptu "Bye Bye Blackbird". Thanks to all of the members of the orchestra for welcoming us. You will be able to see some clips of the concert in the film part of the project. You can listen to the interviews with Paul and Henry, along with all of the other musicians interviewed for this project on the interviews page of this website.
In the morning we shared the rough cut of the film with our brilliant team of volunteers. We had a great discussion with lots of very useful feedback that we will be putting into practise for the next edit. In the afternoon we shared the film with many of the musicians interviewed for the project. Another very good and productive discussion. We are just waiting for some more feedback from some who couldn't attend the meetings and we will then do the final edit. We are hoping to launch the film in November 2024 in Kings Place and will be publisizing this as soon as we have a date so watch this space.
Below: Musicians, Clem Cattini, Jacqui Hicks, Dave Green, Tracy Holloway, Henry Lowther, Jack Honeybourne, Alice Spring, Sandy Lowenthal and from digital-works, Sav Kyriacou.
We went along to Sandy's to record him playing some music. He sang Blue Moon which is one of the standards that musicians needed to know to play in the various club and function circuits on Central London. Sandy has roots in Trinidad and also goes by the name of Alex De Great performing as a calypsonian, writing his own pieces and gigging constantly. We recorded a couple of his original calypsos also. It was a real treat! Thanks Sandy. You can see some of his playing in the film and also hear his wonderful interview covering his long career on the interviews page on this website.
We went along to film Matyas Gaynor playing with Dave Green on bass and Steve Brown on drums. This was a wonderful concert and we will be using parts of it for the film part of the project. Many thanks to Matyas and the trio, and to the team at Pizza Express for allowing us to film the concert.
We went along to Jack Honeyborne's 96th birthday celebration at The Spice of Life in Soho where Jack played a couple of great sets with a quintet. We filmed the concert and will be using some of this in the docuemntary film we are making. Thanks to Jack and to all of the musicians. You can hear Jack talking about his career which streches back to the 1930s on the interviews page of this website.
We managed to get a last interview with the wonderful bass player Dave Green. The team at Ronnie Scott's had suggested him to us and they kindly let us interview him at the club. It was a wonderful interview and Dave also treated us to some great bass playing which we filmed too. Thanks both to Dave for making the time to come and be interviewed and to Sarah Weller at Ronnie Scott's. Go to the interviews page on this website to hear the wonderful interview with Dave..
The group of volunteers met online to discuss how the interviews went, any issues that came up and also what themes they found came up which stood out to them during the interviews. We discussed which might be good to include in the documentary film part of the project. We will now edit a rough cut of the film and then meet up again for a screening of this and discussion. The volunteers were great and have been brilliant throughout the process. Thanks to everyone for doing such great work on developing the themes to explore through the interviews, and then for their great work interviewing and also recording the interviews.
Jennifer Maidman and Andy Treacy were both interviewed for this project and both play with the band Kokomo. They were playing at the Albert hall supporting The Average White Band so we went to watch and to film their sound check. It was a great gig. You will be able to see a little bit of it in the film and you can listen to the interviews with Andy and Jennifer now on the interviews page of this website.
The final day of interviews included Jennifer Maidman, Richard Bailey, Rowland Sutherland and Skaila Kanga. All of the interviews were conucted at Westminster Archives with the exception of Skaila Kanga's which took place at the Royal Academy of Music. We even managed to film one of Skaila's talented students, Katie Lo, playing the harp which we will use in the film part of the project. Thanks to the RAM for hosting us.
Thanks to everyone who so generously gave up their time over the past four days to come and be interviewed. The interviews will soon be available to listen to in full on this website and will also be going to the archives at Westminster, Camden and Bishopsgate Institute. We will also be starting to edit the interviews, adding archive footage and photos ready for the launch in Autumn. Watch this space for news on that.
Photos below, in order, Richard Bailey, Jennifer Maidman, Rowland Sutherland, Skaila Kanga and Katie Lo playing harp.
Yet more great oral history interviews with Jaqui Hicks, Andy Treacy, Elaine Delmar, Jack Honeybourne, Sylvia Addison and Eliza Marshall.
Photos below, in order, Elaine Delmar, Jacqui Hicks and her interview team, Jack Honeybourne and his team.
More great oral history interviews with Kuljit Bhamra, Sandy Lowenthal, Andy Findon, Charlotte Kelly, Tracey Holloway and Alice Spring (pictured below)
We completed five fascinating oral history interviews with musicians with a range of backgrounds and experiences. These were Henry Lowther, Paul Clarvis, Clem Cattini, Alan Barnes and Jonathan Hill (pictured below)
We had two very busy days introducing audio recording, interview techniques and then an intense workshop to develop themes and questions to explore in the project, all to be ready for interviews to begin next week.
We had a fascinating walking tour of Soho and the West End with music historian Chris Firmin. We walked around the neighbourhood and Chris pointed out venues and points connected to the history of live music. We finished up in PizzaExpress Jazz Club Soho where the Music Manager, Ross Dines, gave us a brilliant talk about the history of music there and his role. Thanks to Chris for the excellent walk and the team at PizzaExpress for hosting us.
We had a great team of volunteer trainees come along to Westminster Archives for the first day of training. We had a lovely introduction talking about why we were all there and also remembering concerts we had all attended in the West End. Amanda House, who works at the archives, welcomed us and gave a talk on the roll of the archives and how the interviews and ephemera gathered for this project will be added to their collection. Next we ran a workshop around oral history. In the afternoon we had a reminscence session with several musicinas including Sandy Lowenthal, Eliza Marshall, Clem Cattini and Paul Clarvis who all spoke about their working lives.
