Raining jam

Or at least raining jam sessions. This was a new one, in its first incarnation, at Harmonie German Club, with guest band Dr Jawbone and the Restless Souls. Organised like the monthly blues jam with a tabulated chart for names each sets. This was somewhat less daunting than running with the masters, Wayne Kelly's trio at OCI on Wednesdays. Early this year, there was also a pre-tertiary jazz jam session, at Smiths, fortnightly on Thursdays prior to the jazz sessions. Haven't seen that mentioned recently. Nice to see some activity around the traps. Harmonie was a swing-latin affair. Dr Jawbone played several tunes, including some originals. Peter with his chordal 6-string bass and Ross very busy and bluesy, with Ken and an unknown tenor. Then various jammers, including Claude, Andrew, others. I enjoyed playing George Benson Broadway, but then I like a firm bass groove, and perhaps Footprints was the most conceptually modern take. Good fun for just a first incarnation and good luck for future iterations.

PS. One bit of history. The pic is of a piece of genuine Berlin Wall. Reinforced concrete sections like this (measuring 3.6x1.2m) have become relatively rare as the original was broken up and sold in bits or just broken up in anger when the Wall was demolished in 1990-92. This one features original West Berlin graffiti. Congrats to Gunter and the Harmonie German Club for appreciating the historical value of this early enough to buy a piece for Canberra.

The Harmonie German Club Jazz jam featured host band Dr Jawbone and the Restless Souls, with Ross Buchanan (piano), Peter Barta (bass) and Ken Nosworthy (drums).

More Smalls

I've commented before that Wayne Kelly's Trio leading a Wednesday night jam session at the Old Canberra Inn is our local Smalls. I got there last Wednesday. It was cold, cold outside but snug inside with wood fires behind glass and the unexpected warmth of a slab hut, no doubt sealed against drafts. So the venue was hot, good for boutique beers, and the music was too. The band was Wayne, Ben and Mark. The sitins were three drummers, one bass, one trumpet, one piano, one vocal. The piano and vocal were a pair who play Cuban music locally, so we got some great, infectious latin grooves. This really is something special. Elizabeth and Jonathan play in the local band, Clavemania, most recently at Vivaldi. Matthew was the trumpet, a local boy now student at the James Morrison Academy in Mount Gambier. Very nice playing, not least on Joy Spring. The drummers were Ken, Mitch and Andrew. I got to play bass on three favourites: Caravan, Alone together and All blues, mostly with Wayne and a variety of drummers and Matthew. Good fun and nice to play Ben's German trade bass.

But a further Smalls matter has also taken some recently. I thought the Smalls online feed was shut, but no, it's free with registration for live shows and charged for the historical collection. Three sessions each night, 7.30am-4am NYC time, about 10am-6pm AEST. Neat. Two bands then a jam session. Funny thing, over a few days I saw both Ari Hoenig and Joe Farnsworth, two renowned NYC drummers who visited Canberra in just the last few weeks. Small world; Smalls and the world; our small Smalls.

Wayne Kelly (piano), Ben O'Loghlin (bass) and Mark Sutton (drums) lead the weekly jam session at Old Canberra Inn, 7-9pm Wednesdays. Sitins this evening were Matthew Nicholls (trumpet), Andrew Howard, Ken Nosworthy and Mitch Preston (drums), Elizabeth Obando Paz (vocals), Jonathan Cohen (piano) and Eric Pozza (bass).

Smalls NYC live stream