Concert Diary

The autumn saw us at quite a few con­cert events so, in no par­tic­u­lar order:

• The effer­ves­cent Moshe’s Bagel — what energy, what great tunes, what syn­ergy between piano and fiddle in particular.
• The stun­ning Jan Gab­arek at the Sage in New­castle. The man has sud­denly gone all boogie-woogie, and Rainer Brun­ing­haus on the piano really lets it rip.  A two and a bit hour con­cert with only 4 num­bers and an encore — abso­lutely great to hear a piece develop over 25 minutes or so.
• The Tord Gust­avsen Trio at the Venue in Leeds.  Soft jazz — it makes a delight­ful evening.
• The Por­tico Quar­tet — al fresco on the South Bank in Lon­don. Really excit­ing young jazz musi­cians with a great sound.
• John Sur­man and theTrans4mation string quar­tet at the Wig­more Hall for the Lon­don Jazz fest­ival — I love these cros­sover gigs — such beau­ti­ful sound.
• Knut Reier­srud (guitars),Iver Kleive (organ) and Son­dre Brat­land doing “Rosa fra Betle­hem” at the Jac­ob­skirche in Oslo.  Tra­di­tional Nor­we­gian (and other) Christ­mas songs with such invent­ive back­ing from the two long time collaborators.

Live music is so worth­while — almost always.