Hoot Jazz Band, The Hive Music & Media Centre, Shrewsbury, 19/01/2025

Chris Stevens – director, trumpet, flugelhorn
Mike Wright – trombone
Allan Dickie, Stuart Maine, Stan Swift – tenor saxes
Bev Horsley, Kim Beasley, Chris Pearson – alto saxes
Nick Cunningham – baritone sax
Nil Adams - flute
Alison Stevens – piano
Andrew Jones – guitar
Nick Rogers – electric bass
Rich Williamson – drums

The Hive has been the home of Shrewsbury Jazz Network for many, many years. I attended my first SJN event there in January 2020 and have returned on a regular basis over the course of the last fifteen years, enjoying and later reviewing many exceptional jazz performances in the process.

On average SJN presents one event per month but there’s far more to The Hive than that. A registered charity it also presents other musical events across a variety genres, including a particularly strong folk and Americana programme. There are also regular film screenings, with a focus on international cinema, plus talks, workshops and exhibitions of visual art.

The Hive also runs an acclaimed outreach and well being programme that extends across the wider Shropshire area. There is a particular focus on activities for young people and this aspect of The Hive’s activities represents a particularly important part of the Charity’s work, and has done so for the past nineteen years.

In these straitened times and with funding for the Arts increasingly being pared to the bone The Hive has been struggling to make ends meet. A successful JustGiving campaign simply titled Save The Hive has been launched and today’s fundraising gig was just the latest event to be a part of that campaign.

In addition to the JustGiving fund raising page itself various events have taken place at The Hive with the aim of raising money to save the venue. Other fund raising gigs have seen musicians across a variety of genres, from punk to funk, donating their services to help The Hive. Money has also been raised from the sale of CDs and other music related merchandise, with locally based singer-songwriter Beth Prior generously donating a whole stack of albums and EPs for sale. I treated myself to some of these, the personnel includes jazz guitarist Will Barnes, and they really are very good – an enjoyable listening experience in their own right in addition to raising money for The Hive.

The Save The Hive campaign has proved to be very successful and the venue has raised enough funds for it to be able to continue for at least another year. However the fund raising efforts will continue with the aim of helping The Hive continue to flourish in the longer term.

This afternoon’s event saw the jazz genre, and SJN in particular, doing its bit to raise funds to ensure the ongoing survival of The Hive. The Hoot Jazz Band is a fourteen piece amateur ensemble comprised of musicians from all over Shropshire, from Ludlow in the south to Whitchurch in the north. All of the money raised from this sold out Sunday afternoon performance went directly to The Hive, thus helping to ensure that the venue will continue to be the home of SJN, with a strong programme scheduled for the rest of 2025.

The Hoot line up includes Mike Wright, Chair of Shrewsbury Jazz Network, who plays trombone with the band. Also featured is tenor saxophonist Allan Dickie, another SJN stalwart.

Hoot is led by its musical director and trumpeter Chris Stevens and the band’s repertoire features what the advance publicity promised would be “a dash of Blues, a shake of Jazz, a slice of Township, and a pinch of soul”. They were to deliver on all of these, with the Township aspect representing a particularly strong and distinctive strand in a diverse and well chosen programme that did far more than just cover the predictable big band staples.

Although this wasn’t a “professional jazz gig” I was determined to show my support for the Save The Hive campaign and paid my entrance fee, not really expecting to write a full review of the performance but instead just to pen a few words about The Hive’s fund raising efforts.

Mike Wright, who handled the majority of the announcing duties had rather downplayed the band’s abilities, claiming that they were “just a motley crew of very enthusiastic amateurs”, adding “please be gentle with us”. To be honest I wasn’t expecting a lot but the quality of the band’s performance plus the interesting nature of the programme quickly won me over and I soon decided that a full review really should be the order of the day, with the members of Hoot receiving full credit for their efforts.

Things kicked off predictably enough with an arrangement of the Duke Ellington / Juan Tizol classic “Caravan” that featured an authentic big band sound and included solos from Adams on flute, Chris Stevens on trumpet and Dickie on tenor, with Williamson also weighing with a drum feature. An enjoyable and invigorating start.

A Latin strand also formed an important part of the Hoot repertoire with the music of the Puerto Rican drummer, composer and bandleader Tito Puente (1923-2000) particularly well represented. First we heard a version of Puente’s “Oye Como Va”, a song that was later a hit for Santana. It was therefore appropriate that guitarist Jones should feature prominently as he shared the solos with the alto saxes of Pearson and Beasley.

The first of several Township jazz items was “August One”, written by the South African saxophonist and composer Dudu Pukwana (1938-1990). It was great to hear these rarely played Township Jazz pieces and Hoot’s love for their source material was obvious, with solos coming from Dickie on tenor, Beasley on alto and Wright on trombone.

Another unusual choice was “Hush”  a 1970s tune by the American trumpeter Donald Byrd (1932-2013) that featured solos from Jones on guitar, Alison Stevens on piano (a Yamaha electric keyboard on an acoustic piano setting) and Rogers on five string electric bass. Incidentally Alison is the mother of trumpeter and bandleader Chris. Many of Hoot’s selections feature arrangements by members of the band or people associated with it, as opposed to an over reliance on stock ‘Real Book’ arrangements. To my mind this makes their efforts all the more admirable. This particular piece was arranged by saxophonist / flautist Casey Greene, Hoot’s former leader. The Australian born Greene was a Shrewsbury resident for many years, a highly talented musician, composer and bandleader who appeared on the Jazzmann web pages on numerous occasions during his lengthy tenure in Shropshire. He has now returned to his native Australia, but still retains strong links with his friends in the UK. Sometimes he also manned the mixing desk at SJN gigs.

The American alto saxophonist and composer Lou Donaldson died in 2024 at the age of ninety eight. Like Donald Byrd he was a Blue Note recording artist and Pearson’s arrangement of Donaldson’s hard bop classic “Midnight Creeper” represented Hoot’s tribute to Donaldson. Solos here came from Rogers on electric bass and Maine on tenor.

Chris Stevens’ arrangement of “Emalangyni”, by the African Jazz Pioneers, represented a joyous return to the South African Township Jazz sound and included solos from Horsley on alto, Adams on flute and Cunningham on baritone sax. The tune was first introduced to Stevens by Hoot alto saxophonist Kim Beasley.

An arrangement of Duke Ellington’s enduringly popular “C Jam Blues” was a rare excursion into more familiar big band territory with solos from Wright on trombone and Swift, a ‘man of the cloth’ on tenor. Also featured were Pearson, also the arranger of the piece, on alto and Dickie on tenor.

I thought the band might take a break there, with Ellington tunes topping and tailing the first set. But such was their collective enthusiasm that they carried on ‘full steam ahead’ with the notoriously difficult Sammy Nestico arrangement of the Count Basie tune “Hay Burner”. This was essentially an ensemble piece, introduced by the rhythm section, with the horns joining in later. Collectively they tackled a complex piece, described by Wright as “a bit of a lip curler”, with considerable aplomb.

“I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free”, a gospel infused tune written by pianist and composer Dr. Billy Taylor and variously made famous by Nina Simons and by Barry Norman’s Film programme followed. This included solos from tenor saxophonists Dickie and Swift, these punctuated by Horsley’s excursion on alto.

A lengthy first set concluded with a big band arrangement of the celebrated Joe Zawinul composition “Birdland”, a tune that represented something of a commercial zenith for the band Weather Report. Given the presence of Jaco Pastorius and Wayne Shorter in the Weather Report ranks it was only fitting that the featured soloists should be bassist Rogers and tenor saxophonist Dickie.

Chris Stevens and the band had got a bit carried away during the hour long first half and time restrictions meant that the second set had to be somewhat truncated. With an impressive hundred tunes in the book actually choosing which ones to play and which ones to omit represents something of a dilemma.

The start of Set Two took us back to South Africa and the Abdullah Ibrahim composition “Mandela”, with bassist Rogers again a featured soloist, alongside Cunningham on baritone sax, Wright on trombone and Pearson on alto.

A Neal Hefti arrangement of the Count Basie tune “Little Darling” presented another, gentler side of the band. This was a ballad featuring a lusher reeds and brass sound, with Chris Stevens and Wright deploying mutes. The featured soloist was tenor saxophonist Maine.

Another Basie tune, “Shiny Stockings”, increased the energy levels once more and included a tenor sax solo from the consistently impressive Dickie, plus a brushed drum feature from Williamson.

Even more upbeat was a punchy arrangement of “Hip Dudes”, a tune by the Australian musician Richard Percival. “Perhaps it should be ‘Hip Replacement Dudes’, given our ages” quipped Wright. Dickie’s tenor was again prominent in the arrangement with Swift on tenor and Cunningham on baritone featuring as soloists.

A vibrant Casey Greene arrangement of the Wes Mongomery tune “Road Song” kept the pot bubbling with Dickie again emerging as the star sax soloist as he traded solos with guitarist Jones.

There was a second dip into the repertoire of Tito Puente with the Latin flavourings of his composition “Ran Kan Kan”, with solos from Adams on flute, Wright on trombone and the impressive Jones on guitar.

The afternoon concluded on a surprisingly gentle note with an arrangement of Whoza Mtwana”, a second Abdullah Ibrahim composition. Introduced by Alison Stevens at the piano, with the support of bass and drums, this was essentially an ensemble piece that presented a softer side of the Township Jazz sound. After the high energy pieces that had directly preceded it this item functioned as a kind of lullaby, sending the audience home in a state of contentment.

I’ll admit that I hadn’t really expected an awful lot from this gig but I enjoyed myself far, far more than I had expected. This was due to the imaginative, unusual and largely unexpected repertoire, the quality of the playing and the sheer enthusiasm of Chris Stevens and the ensemble as a whole.

This was perhaps the largest audience that Hoot had ever played to and many of the band members admitted to feeling nervous beforehand, but they rose to the challenge magnificently, playing with great enthusiasm and no little skill. It wasn’t as slick as a fully professional outfit, but that was hardly the point. This was about the sheer enjoyment of playing music together, some of it challenging and demanding,  and raising money for a very worthy cause in the process. Well done to Chris Stevens, Mike Wright and the whole Hoot Jazz team.

Thanks also to Chris for confirming all the tune titles and for providing me with a list of personnel, which was been invaluable in the writing of this article. Hope you enjoy reading the review!

To donate to the Save The Hive campaign and for details of forthcoming Shrewsbury Jazz Network and other events at The Hive please visit;
http://www.hiveonline.org.uk

 

 

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