JUMPING THROUGH HOOPS

 "You can't put a download on a shelf", a very wise friend said to me when in 2018 I released a drum instructional video package as a physical product (DVD, as it happens, and yes it is still avail able as physical product or digital download from my website.).

The consumption of music has changed beyond all recognition in recent years, not for the better in my opinion, due in no small part to the global domination of outfits such as Spotify, ITunes and all the rest of them. The ease with which 'content' (hate that word in this context) may be streamed or downloaded does, I feel, rather devalue music, giving it a somewhat 'disposable', 'throwaway' quality which with physical product is simply not the case. Whilst having music wherever you go is undeniably convenient, and a blessing when shutting out the modern world is desirable, turntable versus mp3 player can be a bit like comparing a lavish three course lunch with scoffing a takeaway wrap in the street.

 In the room in which I write there are vinyl records that I have owned for fifty years, and a great many (including a large collection of near mint big band and be bop 78s) that have been in my family since long before I was born.

Ah, yes, the joy of vinyl, the sense of occasion, ceremony even, that comes with putting a vinyl record on the turntable. The satisfaction of having completed the bus journey back from Birmingham city centre having parted with teenage gig earnings in the Record Centre (better known as Jazz & Swing because that's what it said on the carrier bags), The Diskery (best for rarities but premium prices) or the by comparison more prosaic offerings of WH Smiths, HMV or Midland Educational, all of whom in fairness had more than adequate selections of the current jazz releases.

Reading the liner notes, studying the photographs, and of course listening to the music. A whole album would be bought just on the back of one track. I remember aged twelve acquiring the seminal Average White Band 'AWB' LP (its rather saucy cover image precipitating raised eyebrows from our dear Mum) on account of the chart success of 'Pick Up The Pieces', only to find that all the other tracks on the album were, if anything, superior.

Of course if funds were tight one could opt for a 45 RPM seven inch single, freely available from your local Woolworths without necessitating a trip to the city. Also I had discovered former chart hits sold cheaply as 'ex jukebox', a viable means of adding to ones collection at a knockdown price.

However, at this point in the 70s the singles market was very much geared to radio play and chart success. Jazz on 45s was undeniably a thing of the past, and many such imprints were among the records we had at home, perhaps most significantly 'Sounds of the Loop' by the Dave Brubeck Quartet featuring a drum solo by Joe Morello which in many ways remains unmatched to this day, 67 years after it was recorded.

You can see where this is going can't you?

In my early years as  a Midlands based professional musician I worked a lot. I was a capable all-round pro player and by my mid 20s had amassed plenty of experience. What the Midlands lacked though was any record industry to speak of. Yes, we had hugely successful bands that broke through at that time: who can forget all the great music produced by Two Tone records, an organisation that did so much good on many levels. No, what the Midlands lacked was any kind of a 'session' scene aligned to the record industry. A small cabal of musicians had all the local ITV and BBC work sown up, but pretty much all the freelance record session musicians were based in London.

So it was the case that in spite of doing pretty well in the Midlands and playing jazz where I could, (again, some really good musicians, a few places to play but no sort of a proper 'joined up' scene) the one gaping omission in my CV at that point was recording credits. My sole efforts on vinyl were 'Starburst', a bit of a curate's egg of an album by the Midlands Youth Jazz Orchestra and two guest tracks (also with MYJO) on an album entitled 'Radio Leicester Big Band and Friends'.

BBC Radio Leicester had its own big band. Let that sink in. They crop up again later, coincidentally.

It would be three years into my time living in London before I started to get asked to play on people's records. That really was the toughest nut to crack, and it did irk for quite a while. By this time of course, everything was being issued on CD, and vinyl was, temporarily as it has turned out, extinct.

Anyway, that yawning gap in my achievements has been more than adequately compensated over the ensuing three decades, and I have had the good fortune to play on some very good records with some very good people (selected discography can be found on my website if you're interested). Of particular importance were the three big band albums I recorded and produced as a leader. These releases may well be joined by a fourth and even fifth release, but that's for later.

Meanwhile, having ticked such a big box with my own big band recordings, what better a thing to do than to channel that experience into producing a big band record for somebody else, together with the double benefit of playing drums on the session.

With Simon Spillett's fabulous big band (which forensically examines the compositions and arrangements of Tubby Hayes) came the perfect opportunity. Simon had the product, I had the money (ably assisted by very generous crowd funders who covered about 25% of the cost of the project) and in September last year 'Dear Tubby H' was released on CD to thoroughly deserved critical acclaim. Mister PC Records was up and running. What a way to start. June this year saw a limited edition double vinyl deluxe edition of Simon's album, and there are several sessions in the can with others planned for next year.

Amongst this is a session I hadn't intended to record by a band I never planned to form.

Last Spring I had a studio and engineer booked when at the eleventh hour the planned session could not proceed. Rather than throwing in the towel and cancelling everything, a quick phone around ensured the services of A-listers Simon Allen, Vasilis Xenopoulos, Steve Fishwick and Mark Nightingale. I retained the previously engaged rhythm section colleagues Rob Barron and Alec Dankworth (why wouldn't you?) Repertoire was a no-brainer. In my office cupboard live the charts for the Ministry of Jazz, the seven piece band formed in 2015 as a pragmatic measure to satisfy promoters and venues who did not have the budget or square footage to accommodate my big band performing our hugely popular and successful tribute to Buddy Rich. Requests to play that repertoire with half the band left at home were declined, not always politely, but a bit of contemplation resulted in the decision to offer a smaller group featuring entirely different music and different musicians from the big band.

So an album's worth of material resulted from a highly productive day, and a couple of the tracks I felt were quite resonant and commercially viable, so the idea of releasing a single germinated in my customarily ambitious and over active mind.

The A side is a thing called 'Hoops'. Very much in the soul jazz, boogaloo vein it conjures up images of sharply dressed mods and Northern Soul all-nighters. 

Anyway, here comes the Radio Leicester Big Band again. On my eighteenth birthday I was in the unlikely setting of Golders Green Hippodrome, recording a Radio 2 broadcast for the much missed national big band competition. MYJO had triumphed in the youth category, and alongside us were the senior winners from Radio Leicester, including the fabulous Dougie Wright on drums.  Amongst their repertoire on the show was Peter Herbolzheimer's arrangement of Dieter Reith's composition 'Hoops'. I liked it on first hearing, and stored it in my memory, thinking that I might do something with it one day. And so I have.

The 45 RPM single of 'Hoops' is released officially on September 30th, and  a huge proverbial tip of the metaphorical hat is due to percussionist and DJ Snowboy, who on hearing the track some months ago insisted that I release it as a vinyl single. Sound advice as the pre release sales are little short of astonishing.

Over the coming weeks the all important PR campaign swings into action, and if you see a slightly familiar face on television, in the newspapers, or a well modulated voice on radio regurgitating much of what you have almost finished reading, that'll be me. I might even break out one of the seldom seen purple jackets.

Aiming high as is my default position I'm anticipating a nationwide dance craze and being a breakthrough chart artist at the tender age of 61, because if you don't try, you don't get.

I've jumped through all kinds of Hoops to get here, and I'll see you at the BRIT awards.

You can buy the single via Bandcamp or by following the website link at the beginning of this blog post.