30th March Sax Orgy. Williams-Pearce Ripper!

There were saxes of every shape and size on offer this Sunday, and a packed house once again. It's been so good to see so many of you there, but keep telling your friends about us, as there is still room for a few more at the back!

Chris Pearce (soprano/clarinet) and Cliff Williams (tenor/clarinet) were the booked attractions, and were joined for part of the session by John Ripper (see last time's review) on baritone. The session took a couple of numbers to get into its stride, but once it did, we had a night did we not?

Oddly enough, it took a slow blues (Texas Moaner) to ignite things, and many of the best numbers of the evening turned out to be the slow ones. Cliff gave us a perfect rendering of Nancy With the Laughing Face, a la Coltrane. It was my third gig with Cliff in a week, and I can tell you, every one a real pleasure. The guy combines taste and inventiveness with a tone like honey.

Chris scored a second-half equaliser with his version of Willow Weep for Me. I happen to know that this is one he saves for the big occasions, so we can feel flattered at Spring Lane. At the risk of repetition, the great pleasure of working behind Chris is his taste and good judgement, which has one listening hard and savouring the ideas that emerge.

And of course we had the treat of John Ripper getting up with the big gun, and contributing most fluently. John springs from a big band background, and a lot of what we played last evening was not familiar to him - not that you'd have known.

In the engine room we had Graham Smith on drums, Len and me. Graham is not only a great drummer, he has wit - he gets a certain look in his eye and you know he's going to work some little trick that'll leave you grinning. Working without a piano man was by way of an experiment, to see whether this lets a two-man front line stand out more clearly. Tell us what you think.

The evening finished on a high as we rocked through a couple of dixieland traddie ones, which (judging by the bopping I could see at various tables) seemed to send everyone home smiling.

Thanks to everyone who came up after the gig to say they'd had fun! That's what makes Malvern special for your musicians!

Sorry there are no pix this week - the box Brownie must have been on the blink!