Caroline Scott trio, Swinging Magpies and MO Jazz Orchestra gigs
Good week so far.. Rehearsed with Cygnus Flare, the Swinging Magpies and the MO Jazz Orchestra for upcoming gigs and dep'ed on drums with another big band last night. Went to a couple of jam sessions - The Junction jazz bar in Brixton on Tuesday and Ronnie Scott's on Wednesday where they have good jam sessions upstairs and downstairs. Tonight it's off to Gloucester with the Swinging Magpies for a private event, then tomorrow (Saturday) afternoon we're playing back in London at a food/tea event at St Luke's Kentish Town from 1:30pm. I've put a trio together of musicians that I've met and enjoyed playing with at the Ronnie Scott's jam for a gig tomorrow night featuring Liam Steven's (piano) and Joe Boyle (bass) with guest horn players, from 8:30pm at The Junction jazz bar in Brixton. Come down if you live nearby! Then on Sunday the MO Jazz Orchestra are playing from 3pm at The Vortex jazz club in Dalston - one of my favourite venues in London, it's run by cool people who regularly manage to put on great music! We're doing that version of Caravan in the film Whiplash with a crazy amount of drum solos written into the arrangement, I'll try to keep it tasteful!
The most exciting thing just now is since the last couple of timpani gigs, something seems to have clicked and I've been able to sing the note A without a tuning fork. Since you can then get the other notes from that, I was hoping this would help with my ability to retune timpani! Although a pianist friend pointed out that this ability is often confused when there's music playing, so I'm not sure yet if it will be that useful.
Have a lovely weekend.