Great Players scott hamilton

[zootsaxenberger]

howsthis for a small world moment my Gran and Grandad had a farm not far from the Great Danes Hotel just across the road from one of the
many entrances to Leeds Castle, i spent many happy holidays there as a boy.
apparently my gramps and the local Bobbie used to nip into the Castle grounds and " borrow" the odd pheasant ah! happy days.

 

[Young Col]

Small World indeed Zoot. The Hotel is still on the map and you can get a great view of Leeds castle from the M20 (I'm sure you know, but others may not!).
Those were the days, when the local Bobbie lived in a police house that doubled as his station. Crime was pretty well non-existent. There was a police house in Chart Sutton where my late in-laws had two and a half acres of cobnut farm.
Sorry, this has come a long way from Scott Hamilton!
YC

 

[zootsaxenberger]

Isn't that how the best conversations go? you start on some common interest debate and wander off onto other ground. great!

 

[Young Col]

An old thread, but back to Scott Hamilton. He's someone I have listened to quite a lot since this thread started years ago. With family visiting over Easter I've only just now got round to reporting that I saw Scott live at the Watermill Jazz club in Dorking, Surrey, last Thursday. I've saw him there a few years back supported by Alan Barnes and a larger group. This time it was just his UK quartet along with John Pearce (p), Dave Green (b) and Steve Brown (d).

Scott was his usual self-effacing, quiet, humorous persona. At first congratulating himself for remembering the name of the first number. He was having trouble with the upper B and C pearl keys and his reed during the first set and it was amusing to see him sit down during an extended piano solo, change the reed and then run some paper through the pads to clean them (sadly too small pieces to be the classic ciggy papers), There seemed to be no set list and when he played a fragment of a theme (turned out to be a Quincy Jones number) asking "do we know this?" it turned out no-one knew the bridge and Scott broke off his solo with "how do I get out of this?".

Amusement apart though, when he played, he really played. Memorable numbers included a first set encore of a 30's Basie/Young number where he launched in to the first four bars of the Lester Young solo and then took off on his own, plus a cracking second set version of Cherokee. There were too many great numbers to remember all the names but all together it made for a superb evening. Well worth seeing if you can catch his visits here. Swing revival to modern/mainstream is perhaps one way to describe him. Nothing ever histrionic, just cool laid back even on up tempo numbers. Brilliant.

 

[saxendd]

Thanks. I really enjoyed the video. nice clean playing. The tenor is really, really cool.

 

[trimmy]

A good documentary with Scott Hamilton

and he cant read music! must just be a natural.

Oh yes he can, not a natural just hard work got him there 🙂

View: http://youtu.be/yx3gx5lR7cQ

 

[jimmylh]

He says he doesn't read music, but in an interview I saw, he stated that it's more like he doesn't read fast enough to play in big band/orchestra settings. He says he never bothered to develop his reading because he would rather play in small groups without sheet music. He says he knows plenty of theory. He is also one of my favorite players.

 

[trimmy]

6-20 in...
"I don't sight read saxophone music, that's what i mean, people don't really understand that"

 

[valjeanmeister]

He can also play the piano a bit,

 

[Jo]

Hi Zoot, thanks for the response. I think Mike must be late 60's now. He was a bit older than me. I think he lived in Smarden. I knew him from work in London, but my wife's parents used to live in Chart Sutton and we used to go and see Mike and his band at the Great Danes Hotel, Hollingbourne in the early 1980s (not sure if it's still there, got by-passed by the M20 extension). Good enough player to have gone pro. He came over to see us one evening when we we were down there and I had to lend him my Basie and Zoot (Sims) album as he was knocked out by it - hardly surprising, it's a cracker!
Cheers
YC

Hi YC, if you’re still there! Mike Jefferson was my father! Nice to read your flattering words. He was actually in his early 80s in 2010 and died in 2012. He did indeed live in Smarden where we had a New Orleans style funeral with John Mason and various Kentish musicians in procession.
He did nearly go pro with the Humphrey Lyttelton band in the late 40s, but didn’t as Johnny Parker was demobbed and Dad’s father insisted he (Dad) do the Civil Service entrance exams! Parker joined Lyttelton and Dad joined the Board of Trade! He continued to play outside the day job. I’ve been listening to a recording of him playing with George Melly in Gravesend circa 1973. Very good and v. funny!
We would take his grandsons to see him play Sunday lunch time at the Lower Bell Inn, on Bluebell Hill in 1990s.
Jo
Btw The Great Danes Hotel is still there - wouldn’t recommend it tho’ more of a service station!

 

[Jo]

Hi YC, if you’re still there! Mike Jefferson was my father! Nice to read your flattering words. He was actually in his early 80s in 2010 and died in 2012. He did indeed live in Smarden where we had a New Orleans style funeral with John Mason and various Kentish musicians in procession.
He did nearly go pro with the Humphrey Lyttelton band in the late 40s, but didn’t as Johnny Parker was demobbed and Dad’s father insisted he (Dad) do the Civil Service entrance exams! Parker joined Lyttelton and Dad joined the Board of Trade! He continued to play outside the day job. I’ve been listening to a recording of him playing with George Melly in Gravesend circa 1973. Very good and v. funny!
We would take his grandsons to see him play Sunday lunch time at the Lower Bell Inn, on Bluebell Hill in 1990s.
Jo
Btw The Great Danes Hotel is still there - wouldn’t recommend it tho’ more of a service station!

 

[Young Col]

View attachment 34618

Hi Jo, yes still here and your message made me put up my first post for years! Great to hear about your dad. Sorry about his passing but pleased he got a proper send off. I didn't know that background, but it confirms what a good pianist he was. I worked with him on european trade policy in the Department of Trade and Industry in Victoria Street, Westminster (the building no longer there) in the late 1970s and it must have been casual chat that made us realise we had jazz in common.
As for The Great Danes, in a later job working for a Goverment appointed committee of inquiry, I selected it for a working weekend away for them. The committee members included several knights of the Realm, a peer, several professors and senior industrialists. It was a good venue for the event. It shows how far it has fallen now. Just visible from the M20 I think.
For myself, the "Young" in YC is now hardly appropriate, but I play lead alto in an amateur big band in Redhill, Surrey and 1st tenor in another in Reigate.
Now I'm going to have to check in to the cafe again after many years!
Great to hear from you!
YC