Whilst this definitely a bit of a ‘Classical’ year for me; I was still musically inspired by Gypsy/Jazz; and two key releases in particular that were released in CD and DVD format: Romane’s excellent ‘Roots and Groove‘ project, and Angelo Debarre – Live In Paris.
But I also continued to focus on building up a Classical collection, albeit almost entirely focussed on the ‘Romantic’ era, with a dash of 20th Century works, including my favourite recording of Holst’s: The Planets to date, by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra conducted by James Levine. After the Bruckner and Mahler concerts of the previous year, I focussed on those two composers, developed a particular fondness for Bruckner. I also continued to explore Wagner, and went to several other classical concerts with my friends Bill and Jake; including a trip to London to see the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Claudio Abbado; a conductor who superseded Karajan as my favourite interpreter of these great classics. And last but not least, I discovered a fantastic pianist called Valentina Lisitsa on YouTube, who was subsequently signed by Decca records.
Meanwhile on the band front; During my sabbatical of a few months, after the split of The Hot Club, I had chance to reflect and think about what I wanted to do. John Coulson and I were still sticking together and covering our various regular gigs with a variety of guests, including Ben Holder on violin, Ben Martin on saxophone, and Matt Kerry on guitar.
By now I was listening more and more to classical music; the study of which had become my hobby on the side. But I still felt the pull of Gypsy/Jazz. And even after the peak of The Hot Club, I still felt that I had not fully explored everything that this fascinating genre of music had to offer.
Even back in the days of Swing ’91, I had felt a pull towards the more ‘modern’ side (in jazz terms) of this genre, as expressed by Bireli Lagrene and a now upcoming generation of new gypsy/jazz guitarists.
But in truth I had only succeeded up to a point, in assimilating this particular angle into my playing as a lead guitarist. I felt that I had forged my own approach, but I struggled with the technical demands of the ‘modern’ side of jazz, and I decided to accept this and focus on my strengths.
For many years, since I had started going to the Samois Django festival back in ’92, my seemingly natural skill (in the sense that I never had to work at it) as rhythm guitarist in the genre, had been noticed and received many compliments and a lot of attention over the years; and after the Hot Club, it felt like the right thing to do, to drop off the front line and drive from the back, in a new project that would be roughly conceived around Bireli Lagrene’s Gypsy Project MkII.
I had two front line musicians in mind who certainly had no problems with the technical side of the more modern slant that I had in mind.
Richard Smith was a superb guitarist who I had known since Swing ’91 burst onto the Nottingham scene. We had played together several times over the years at various gigs, and I was always impressed by both his musicianship and his gentle spirit. Meanwhile, saxophonist Ben Martin was well known on the music scene as one of the best players around, and he had already performed several times in recent years as a guest with the Hot Club.
Luckily, when I approached Richard and Ben with my ideas for putting a new project together which would be Gypsy/Jazz, but leaning into Be-bop territory playing tunes by the likes of Charlie Parker, as well as the later compositions of Django Reinhardt; they both went for the idea. I put together a programme, and after a couple of brief rehearsals, we played our first gig at the Vat and Fiddle in April 2011.
It’s fair to say that after the Hot Club split the previous year, there was some consternation in our fanbase. Many people urged us to get back together and carry on. And for those fans of the gypsy side of the Hot Club; this new band; which I entitled ‘Swingologie‘, with its hard bop approach, was not what many of those fans were looking for to replace the Hot Club. However, we did begin to pick up a small following of our own, and started to do other gigs around Nottingham throughout 2011 and into 2012; where a more hardcore jazz audience was to be found, returning once again to venues like the Lion Inn, and Cafe Rouge, along with new venues like The Pelican Club, where Richard and John and myself developed our own sound as a Trio, which became a very popular feature at the Pelican Club, and other established venues like The Hand and Heart; as Swingologie slowly but surely started to establish itself.
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