Album Review: Frank Sinatra- I Remember Tommy

Now this album is somewhat of a tricky one for me to review, fond as I am of both Frank Sinatra and the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and loved the original recordings they made together. So this album should by all accounts be made of win, the tracks are amongst the most well known they recorded …

Word of the Day Challenge: Quintessence

Here is jazz pianist Bill Evans (not to be confused with the sax playing Bill Evans) and his trio. I would say his piano trio in the 1950s was the Quintessence of the Jazz Piano Trio. https://youtu.be/a2LFVWBmoiw Quintessence

Enraptured Audience

When Mrs A informed me she had joined my old theatre group just before Christmas I was amused. She was cast as half of a pantomime cow in the pantomime of that year, which was based on Jack and the Beanstalk but more had an element of The Goodies about it (the giant was played …

Looking for the Heart of a Saturday Night

In response to Fandango's One Word Challenge: Heart https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OY7m-XOZPKw What does Saturday Night mean to you? Having worked for most of my life in the Pub Trade Saturday Night is one of the busiest nights of the week with early evening drinking trade and the restaurant filling up for the evening and of course the …

Life and Soul

Lady Midnight continued her sweeping greetings of the various guests arriving and circulating around and supplying the guests with glasses of Champers. Thomas sipped from his glass, it wasn't great as it hadn't been adequately chilled or more likely had been out on the trays for way too long. Despite the season, the ambient temperature …

In case you are wondering…

...yes Taking Centre Stage is loosely based on a true story which happened in the last 12 months.

Striking A Blue Note

Word of the Day Challenge: Jaunty https://youtu.be/qJi03NqXfk8 Blue Note Records found themselves with an unexpected hit with Lee Morgan's Sidewinder and as the tune was played on Juke Boxes, Blue Note struggled with demand being a small label. The success of the Sidewinder lead to the inevitable, the attempt to follow it up. So for …

Taking Centre Stage (rated 15)

Your Daily Prompt: Cynosure All eyes were on her now, she was getting a bit self conscious now, she moved slowly and mechanically. You can do this, she told herself and took a deep breath and pulled the zip down slid down the dress. She took a deep breath and looked at the other players …

Rubber Plant Rag

When Sidney Bechet moved to France for his twilight years, he bought with him a number of tunes with him which he'd play with various bands in France. One number he told them was called Coffee Grinder and subsequently became known as such in future recordings. However Bechet wasn't being very truthful and the tune …

Bird of Prey

One of my heroes, like a lot of budding Saxophone players, was the late great saxophonist Charlie Parker who was one of the pioneers of the Bebop movement in the 1940s. Now quite when Bebop started is up for debate, some paint Coleman Hawkins' famous 1939 recording of "Body and Soul" as the beginning. Now …