International Jazz Banjo Newsletter

Daily Planet are pleased to announce that their first two albums "Clarks Secret" and "The Big Scoop" are now available for download at the iTunes Music Store. Also available is Leon Hunt`s debut solo CD "Miles Apart" (which features contributions from Daily Planet alongside many others) and the soundtrack to the critically acclaimed New Vic production of "To Kill a Mockingbird" composed by Leon Hunt and Josh Clark.A third Daily Planet album is due sometime in the first half of 2006 but in the meantime get down to the iTunes Music Store and fill some gaps in your record collection.

Leon Hunt & Daily Planet
www.dailyplanet.co.uk/

Approaching Change, by Scott Whitfield
CD preview by Hans-Joerg Elter

Die vorliegende CD “Approaching Change” von Scott Whitfield beweist überzeugend,daß die viersaitigen Banjos = als Plectrumbanjo C-G-B-D oder Tenorbanjo C-G-D-A = durchaus ihren Platz in der heutigen Populär Musik haben können.Beide Banjospielstile meistert Scott in origineller Weise in swing-songs,wie “Exactly Like You” oder im hard-driving-rock-style “Distance is Deceiving aber auch in country-rock-songs,wie “Night Train” und “Proud Mary”.Er präsentiert geschmackvoll die Präsenz des Banjos neben drums,fretless bass,guitar,trumpet und saxophone.Gefühlvoll
unterstützen ihn seine Begleitmusiker in den Banjopassagen und Melodie bögen,bzw.rhythmischen Einwürfen.Mit “Darkness on the Delta”erzählt Scott Whitfield eine pralle Jazzgeschichte aus dem Mississippi-Delta und erinnert an den klassischen Basin St.Blues aus den Tagen eines Buddy Bolden.Jazzig und ausdrucksstark singt er fast jeden Titel dieser zeitlos schönen CD.Besonders gelungen finde ich die Arrangements bei “Livin´on Borrowed Time”,”Night Train”,”California Love” und “Distance is Deceivin´” - alles Eigenkompositionen “by Scott Whitfield”! Sicherlich ist der Hit “City of New Orleans”,so wie er von Scott und seinen Musikern
gespielt wird,erneut hitverächtig! Zum klaren Gesamtsound gesellt sich sehr harmonisch Scott´s ome Columbine Plectrumbanjo - im Soloteil sehr tricky mehrstimmig gespielt! Swingend geht´s weiter mit “There´ll be some Changes made” in der sog.”gedoppelten” Banjospielweise: während das Plectrumbanjo die Begleitharmonien liefert,spielt das Tenorbanjo die Melodie auf - und Beides durch einen Banjoisten! Hier:auch ein äußerst genußvoller sopransax-chorus von Jon Stutler! Mit “Take it easy” reicht dermusikalische Bogen cross-over in die country-scene der 70iger und 80iger.
Rassig verabschieden sich Scott Whitfield und seine swingenden Musiker mit “I´ve found a new Baby”.Und ich habe eine neue Banjo-CD gefunden! Die ich sehr allen Banjo-CD-Sammlern empfehlen möchte: gekonnte Banjomusik in verschiedenen Spieltechniken zeitlos schön und packend vorgestellt!
Das garantiert erstklassigen Hörgenuß.Die CD hat Scott Whitfield zwischen Nov.2003 und März 2004 produziert.

Hans Jörg Elter ,12.08.2005

Die Mitglieder des Düsseldorfer Banjoclubs trauern um den Verlust Ihres Banjofreundes
Bodo Vooren.
Bodo war mit Leib und Seele dem Club, den Banjos und allem, was damit zu tun hat, verbunden.
Obwohl schon böse von seiner tückischen Krankheit geschwächt, ließ er es sich nehmen, mit letzter Kraft bei dem Auftritt des Banjoclubs, während der Düsseldorfer Jazz Rally mit auf der Bühne zu sein und dort das Waschbrett zu spielen..
Bodo verstarb am 13.8.2005
Wir werden unsere Erinnerung an ihn in Ehren halten.

Guenter Amendt
für den Düsseldorfer Banjoclub

Dear Friends,
We have an acceptable contract for GLIBC 2006 and as I announced before, the dates are April 20, 21, & 22, 2006. I am sad to say that it is a probability that GLIBC 2006 may be the last. I haven't signed the proposed contract for GLIBC 2007. Bottom line is the hotel is wanting us to pay for items we didn't pay for in the past. This, coupled with a room rate of $103 + tax, is not acceptable to me and the committee agrees. The hotel has stated it is the best contract they will offer. Add to this the cost of liability insurance which has doubled in the last year. The GLIBC Committee discussed raising registration rates but decided we couldn't cover the potential costs we may incur.
If we find another suitable hotel at a reasonable rate, we may continue. It doesn't look promising at this time. In the meantime, make your reservations and plan to attend GLIBC 2006. Room rate is same as GLIBC 2005, $88 + tax.

Bill Jackson
Great Lakes International Banjo
Convention Chairman

At last i have found a resting place for the 1000 plus collection of 78 rpm records, plus a few LPs and other bits of Reser memorabilia, which Bill Triggs had collected overthe years.
The entire collection will be lodged as a working archive with the University of Gloucester at Cheltenham. I've met the Head of Learning and Information Services (Ann Mathie) and the Chief Archivist (Lorna Scott) and they are both really keen on the project. They have already sounded out opinion within the university and have discovered solid enthusiasm for the idea, which fits in with another collection that they have of American Blues music.
The discs will all be re-recorded onto CD and DVD which will then become the
reference material. The quality will be as high as possible, with electronic filtering of noise, imperfections in the surface of the discs, etc. This
reference material will then be available for study. We have yet to sort out
the copyright situation to see how widely the material will be available.
There are recordings from other banjoists in the collection (I know Bill had
material by di Pietro, Fillis and others) also a large amount of sheet music.
We have to sort through this. The task has been made much easier by Bill's
meticulous cataloguing of the collection and associated information and by
Sally O'Donoghue (Bill's step-daughter) who was putting the information onto
computer when Bill died. Much of this information will also be made available.
So, as far as is possible within the limits of legal constraints and the
constraints of time and money, the items in the collection will be freely
available for anyone to study. Ann Mathie already has people coming in to
study other collections which the University of Gloucester has archived, and so
will be looking forward to making Bill's collection available too. This has
been my aim - to make this archive as widely available as possible. I am
delighted to have achieved this aim!
So this calls for a little celebration, I think. And a celebration there will
be, but not for a few months. We hope to move the collection before Christmas
(sometime in early December - in an un-marked white van which will take a
hitherto uncharted route through the lanes of Somerset and Gloucestershire in
an effort to shake off the inevitable attempts at hi-jacking the collection!
We are taking advice from GCHQ, which you will remember is also located in
Cheltenham. A local asset). The formal announcement of the new home of the
collection will be made some time in the first few months of next year,
probably to coincide with other events both within the University and the
Cheltenham Festival. Because I fancy we should be having a concert of Reser's
music, presented by some of the people who have kept it alive over the years.
The University will be able to provide funds to stage such a concert, which
will be subsidised by the normal means of "bums-on-seats". There will also be a
special exhibition of related material (I shall be passing among you on a quest
for short-term loans or gifts) and we hope to be able to show film excerpts and
perhaps have an illustrated lecture on the music of the era and Reser's
contribution to the development of the dance band. In fact, anything which
Reser, as a practising musician, would have found relevant to his profession.
It's taken me two years to get this far, but it has been well worth it.
Julian Vincent