Can you put something a bit more uplifting on please...

Playlist

Gracie Abrams - Good Riddance

The Core - Roots

Cloudland Blue Quartet - Two Two One Zero

Pet Shop Boys - Furthermore EP

Kenny Wheeler & John Taylor - On The Way To Two

Tuber - Joyful Science

Water Damage - In E

Tu-Ner - T-2 Tu-Ner for Lovers

Caporaso Ensemble - Encounter

Cloudland Blue Quartet - 2024-04-30 OOTB Rehearsal

Sonny Rollins - Live in Europe 1959 - Complete Recordings

Elgar - Symphony No.2 (Op.63); Overture "In The South"

Nazareth - Greatest Hits

David Munrow: Early Music Consort Of London - Monteverdi's Contemporaries

Suicide - A Way of Life (2005 - Remaster)

The machines awaited...

It was, as is usually the case, early...

Scenes...

Some tasty jazz downloaded today but little time to listen, as, again, is usually the case...

This morning, over to visit my mum, accompanied by Anne...

Some reasonable chat...

...but cut short by her having to be taken for a shoulder X-Ray...

Home - the garden looking good...

On the way, we picked up sandwiches and cakes...

...and proceeded to enjoy quite possibly too many episodes of "Monk"...

Some bass rehearsal...

Late afternoon, Anne was off out to met old schoolchum Susan Wilson for a long leisurely Italian at Pomo...

Meanwhile, your correspondent was also off out - for the latest visit to Out of the Bedroom - arriving in good time...

...at the Safari Lounge...

I had brought my electric guitar and FX pedal with a view to being able to perform a little more comfortably than as usual with the house acoustic...

I secured the first slot in the second half to give time for the set up...

First up tonight was host Jim Bryce, throat recovered from his last appearance - two songs, one on piano and one on guitar...

The latter was better, being less "shouty" - the delivery hampered somewhat by the uneven balance between voice and instruments...

"Ross" had also brought his own guitar but his experience with the sound system convinced me to abandon my plans...

Some excellent finger picking from the big man...

Next, OOTB stalwart, Startled Bee with three songs, which he was struggling to recall if he'd ever played before or, indeed, recorded...

Pixie Moonshine played three recent new songs - I'd enjoyed a good chat with her pre the start of the night - exchanging stories of Toronto, Canada and the file sharing method of music recording, her with her drummer back in Ontario and me with Edward Spark in, erm, Gorebridge, neither of whom have been spotted "in the flesh" for a goodly while...

Last up in the first half was Mike Wheeler - good but one of these singers who, unlike the audience, can hear the full backing band in his head and delivers his songs accordingly...

Post break, during which I nabbed my guitar strap and song sheets from the car, leaving everything else behind, my own slot went not too badly at all - delivering "Callingstill", "A Nice Job in a Small Town" and "If I Fall", rather differently from my rehearsals but such is the nature of these things...

Pre my rendition of "If I Fall", my relating of Sister Pam's comments on our drive back from Hemel, home to Scotland for the last time, just a couple of months before she died (as noted on the sleeve notes of "Starlightnight")...

Pam : “Is that your new album?”

Me, proudly : “Yes”
Pam : “Can you put something a bit more uplifting on please?

...raised a welcome laugh in proceedings...

I was followed by another impressive guitar man, "Alastair"...

...then James McQueen, whose songs I enjoyed more than the one he did a fortnight ago...

I was about to leave when Jim Igoe was announced as the final act of the night - his first song, which I'd never heard before, was quite excellent - the other two, stalwarts of his repertoire - all from his upcoming EP...

Out into the night, just as Jim B was calling for anyone who wanted to do more songs to close things off...

A drive home soundtracked by my iPhone recording - noting all the errors which would have to be worked on tomorrow morning...

A good day, all in all...

Highlight of the Day : Performing...

Today's New Music:-