Virtuoso out of context

[gstark]

Most people who know of Nigel Kennedy know of him as perhaps the world's foremost classical violin player.

As much as I enjoy seeing him play in his classical persona, Nigel loves playing the music of one Hendrix J, and whenever he's in Sydney, he seems to find time to perform in a jazz context. His last few visits were no exception, with gigs at The Basement.

This time, he played at a very new and intimate venue, Kell's Kitchen. This is just two blocks from the fabled El Rocco room, but the intimacy of Kell's, suited Kennedy's style right down to the ground.

With an audience of maybe 100, the whole band was relaxed and playing well beyond what I am used to seeing from these guys, and Nigel was chatting and joking with the band and audience members alike.


Out of the camera, resized only.

Nigel on violin, Jonathan Zwartz on contrabass ...



Dale Barlow on reeds ...



The master at work ...



Hamish Stuart on drums ...




through the glass darkly ...



The music was nothing short of brilliant, with the hottest version of Gillespie's "A Night In Tunisia" that I have ever had the pleasure of hearing. And as to value for money ... the second half of the show extended well beyond a 90 minute set.

If you missed this ... maybe next time. I've uploaded the unprocessed images to my website gallery; there's a couple of hundred there, but they are straight from the camera.

This now means that I have a backlog of about 2500 images for PP. Ouch!

[Reschsmooth]

Hi Gary, and welcome to the forums.

Might I suggest you read the FAQ regarding number of images per post?

Very nice images. I think the 2nd is the best in terms of the lighting and composition.

[joet]

Great stuff, Gary

It seems I've been watching Dale Barlow forever, back even when he was a young star in the Jack Brokenshaw, Errol Buddle etc. era

[zafra52]

Actually, I prefer images 2 and 3. Both of them express that intensity of feeling and mood generated in jazz session. I like that chiaroscuro effect; while the angle of the 3rd image insinuates movement. Now where is the music? I guess with some of those 2500 images you have you could make a decent AV presentation. Thanks for sharing these images and I wish I had been there

[gstark]

Might I suggest you read the FAQ regarding number of images per post?

Thanx, Patrick.

There's always the option, available to all members, of asking an admin or mod for approval to exceed the guidelines in terms of the number of images included in a post, where a series of images might justify that.

Now where is the music?

That is not a question you should be asking me.

Also don't ask me how I know that the second half of the show went for more than the 90 minutes that I mentioned in my first post in this thread: I don't wear a watch these days, and I didn't pay attention to the start time of that second set.

guess with some of those 2500 images you have

The 2500 images go back over the last few weekends, plus other activities. - The A1, ABMF, last weekend at Sheepie's, a few jam sessions during the week ... My haul for Kennedy was 298 images shot during the night. That was before we put the cameras away, to avoid getting some incriminating images.

I did get to record an interview of sorts with Nigel though, but I doubt that there will be anything that I can use on my radio show.

I wish I had been there

Please don't take this as me trying to be glib, but yes, you do. I've seen a lot of people perform live. Hell, I've been fortunate to meet some of the greats, and to have played with a few as well. I do not like the big massed performances that we have foisted upon us these days ... apart from the crowds, those sorts of gigs are just not conducive to helping the musos communicate with the audience.

Even a venue that seats 400 is usually too big to get the best our of the artists, and I cannot tell you what I think about the free Festival of Sydney concerts in the Domain that attract maybe 100000 people ... of whom probably 99993 do not actually go out and regularly support the variety of local venues that put on live music on a regular basis. But if you used "pretty bloody well pissed off" as a starting point ...

I think that The Basement holds around 200 ....

So, to get see Kennedy, in a much smaller, even more intimate venue, no pretensions, audience merely inches from the stage ... audience handing the performers their refreshments during the set (Leigh has a great photo of this) ...

This was what the night was all about ....

This was what live music is all about ...

This was Jazz.

[big pix]

......... the white balance looks a little off........ and welcome to the forum........