Another great night at Abbey Jazz

Another fantastic Sunday night at Abbey Jazz in Malvern. Terry Roberts and Tony Pipkin on tenor and trumpet respectively; Rod Kelly on piano; Martin Emeny drums; Len Thwaites bass and me on guitar. Full house the other side of the mics for this last session of 2007. You just knew it was going to be hot from the first number - a bebop type number I'd never played before, called Apple Honey.

Roberts is a lovely player - inventive, tasteful and exciting. He brought his tenor, alto and clarinet. Tony Pipkin turned up with trumpet, flugelhorn, cornet and something like a miniature tuba, so though there were only two of them in the front line, it looked like a music shop out there. Great choice of numbers all evening - everything from swing standards to bossas, and some of Rod Kelly's speciality rockin' blues.

Its amazing how Len Thwaites gets the combination of musicians, different every session, to fit together like gloves. You're always on your mettle in the rhythm section, as each new combination of front line players wants to do their favourite numbers. That means you're playing, more often than not, numbers you're seeing/hearing for the first time. A good chord book is a life saver at Malvern!

I've been playing at Malvern for a year now and I can't remember a single occasion when the music's been boring. It's no wonder the best people enjoy playing there - somehow we seem to generate a freshness I thought was being lost in a lot of the UK jazz scene.

I know many of the Malvern audience go often to other clubs, where they tend to hear established bands playing the same 20 or 30 numbers time and again. If jazz is to be worth doing, you've got to take risks. I think too, you've got to let the audience know you're enjoying yourselves - it's infectious and I can never understand why so many of the trad bands seem to ignore their audiences and behave as if they were having a private practice.

Still, the great thing is that there's so much live jazz going on in the Midlands. Mind you, the bands and the audiences are getting greyer and greyer. Still, if you get too old to stamp your feet you can always click your dentures!