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Most recent update:
16 June 2013
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British jazz trombonist Chris Barber celebrates his 64th year as a bandleader in 2013. Inspired by the King Oliver Creole Jazz Band, Chris formed his first Barber New Orleans Band in 1949 at the age of nineteen. In 1953, along with Monty Sunshine and Lonnie Donegan, he joined forces with Ken Colyer. Then, with the replacement of Colyer by Pat Halcox, Ken Colyer's Jazzmen became Chris Barber's Jazz Band in 1954 and has been one of Europe's most successful traditional jazz bands ever since.
Over the years, Chris Barber's Jazz Band evolved into the Chris Barber Jazz and Blues Band, a richly-textured eight-piece group, blending brass, reeds, and electric guitar into a unique and unmistakable mix of blues and jazz. And despite being 'on the slide' since 1949, having performed over 10,000 concerts and made thousands of recordings, the Chris Barber Band keeps marching on, right into the 21st century. At the end of 2001 Chris extended his band with three more musicians into The BIG Chris Barber Band. |
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| The Current Line-Up of the Big Chris Barber Band (Sept. 2012) |
| For biographies of each of the band members, plus photos and music clips, go to the Big Chris Barber Band page. |
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Current Personel (September
2012)
Top row, left to right: Chris Barber, Bob
Hunt, Mike Henry, Peter Rudeforth, Richard Exall
Bottom
row, left to right: Ami Roberts, Bert Brandsma, Joe Farler,
Jackie Flavelle, Gregor Beck |
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The Big Chris Barber Band
in April 2013
(Nieder-Olm / Germany)
Richard Exall (clarinet and baritone & alto saxes), Amy Roberts
(clarinet and alto & tenor saxes, flūte),
Jackie Flavelle (bass & bass
guitar), Bert Brandsma (clarinet & tenor sax), Peter Rudeforth (trumpet),
Gregor Beck (drums), Mike Henry (trumpet & cornet), Bob Hunt (trombone
& trumpet), , Chris Barber (trombone),
Joe Farler (banjo & guitar)
(photo/copyright: Klaus
Muempfer) |
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Updated
January 9, 2013
Go to the New and Recent Releases page for more details and other recent releases. |
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New DVD: Das Beste aus dem
Musikladen
35 Top Bands plus a Chris Barber Special
The German TV station ARD (Das Erste) has had a
regular and a very popular TV show called "Musikladen" in the
seventies. It was a kind of "Top of the Pops" and featuread all
the Pop Stars at that time.
Read more
here and check the fantastic Chris Barber Special with 9 great
tunes! |
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Goin' to Town in Carlisle '94
This is # 3 in the new series "Diamond Jubilee Collection" of Lake
Records and it contains almost the complete concert of the 1954
Reunion Band and the Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band of 1994 in
Carlisle (June 4, The Sands Centre)
See our
full review here... |
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Chris Barber at the London Palladium
Peter Brennecke from Germany informed us about another reissue of
a classic concert CD of the Chris Barber Jazz Band: The famous
London Palladium Concert of March 31, 1961, featuring Joe Harriot,
altosax.
We have quite a few information about this
concert and earlier releases on LP or CD.
Read more here... |
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THE RADIO LUXEMBOURG SESSIONS
The
208 Rhythm Club - Volume 1
Chris
Barber's Jazz Band
Ken Colyer's Jazzmen
The Mike Cotton
Jazzmen
We got several mails from fans, reporting
that the Vocalion Label has issued a series of CD's with British
Bands from the sixties.
Indeed, we found a great CD, featuring
the three above mentioned Jazz Bands in 1961. These sessions were recorded for the
radio broadcast purposes and, as such, not issued commercially.
Vocalion presents all these titles on CD for the first time,
remastered from the original tapes.
See the full review here |
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Chris Barber & the Clarinet Kings
This is the second in a new series of CDs from Lake
Records, “The Diamond Jubilee Collection”, featuring the 1962 band
with Edmond Hall and the 1968 band with Albert Nicholas, together
with four studio tracks with Joe Darensbourg. CD-1 begins with
Chris Barber’s American Jazz Band, recorded in New York in 1960.
These tracks run the gamut from driving swing (Down Home Rag) to a
soft and beautiful blues, especially notable for Chris’s solo
(Tishomingo Blues.) The rest of CD-1 contains eight Hall studio
recordings plus two concert recordings. Wonderful stuff! CD-2
begins with two more Hall concert tracks, followed by seven with
Albert Nicholas, while the Joe Darensbourg tracks make up the
final four. Every one of the Nicholas tracks is outstanding:
traditional jazz blues at its very best by anyone, anywhere. The
Darensbourg tracks are different in that they include only Chris
Barber and Pat Halcox from the Barber Band, together with several
well-known English musicians. All are relaxed and enjoyable. See the full review here |
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Clearing the Air in Bern '92
This is a new double-CD from a concert recorded at the Kursaal
Bern / Switzerland, on 14 February 1992. Niklaus Zust, the
recording engineer, refers to the quite amusing title as follows:
"The concert from beginning to end was so overpowering that dusty
spiders-webs fell from the roof and vanished: music which cleared
the dust in every way!"
This double CD, issued by Lake
Records LACD312, is the beginning of a series entitled "The Diamond Jubilee
Collection" and will comprise several CD's from various points in
the band's history with no particular chronology or theme and will
supplement CD's already in the Lake records catalogue.
See
our short review of this double CD here |
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European Tour 2011: New Faces
This new CD covers almost a complete concert of the present Big Chris Barber Band. However, not all the recordings are from a single concert: all the recordings were made in January and February 2011 in England, Scotland and Germany. Rebecca Evans, the band's sound engineer, mixed and put together the best ones from several concerts for the CD, supported by the band's banjo player Joe Farler, known as a technical wizard. The sound quality of the live recordings is great.
The CD features the new faces among the band: David Horniblow, clarinet & saxes, since March 2010; Jackie Flavelle, bass/bass guitar, who joined the band in August 2010, but was formerly on tour with Chris Barber from 1967 to 1977; Amy Roberts, saxophone and clarinet - the outstanding young talent joined the forces of the Big Chris Barber Band in January 2011; and Gregor Beck, drums, started in April 2010 with the band. See our review of this CD here. |
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The list below covers the last
nine months.
For a complete list of updates to the website since February 2004,
go to the News and Website Updates page.
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June 16, 2013
From about 1974 till the early 2000 Mr. Vic Gibbons published a
regular Newsletter, covering tours, records etc. of the Chris
Barber Jazz & Blues Band. Starting in June 2013, we will
publish in the archive section these newsletters, giving us a
deep insight of the activites of that time.
Click here
to read the newsletters. |
June 2, 2013
Karl-Wilhelm
Specht from Germany sent us another set of photos from the Jazz & Blues
Band period. This time the pictures are from a concert in Stone in March
1993. Enjoy these pictures from the "pre-digital-era". |
May 31, 1954 - May 31, 2013
59 years
ago...
This was the day when the Chris Barber
Jazz Band was formed... and Chris is still going strong.
Congratulations to Chris for such a great time with fantastic
music |
May 24, 2013 - TV Programme
For all those
who have missed this great Jazz evening on BBC 4
- 50s
Britannia, Trad Jazz Britannia (with a lot of Chris
Barber Music and Interview)
- Jazz625 with a concert with
Acker Bilk's Paramount Jazz Band plus Beryl Bryden and George
Lewis
- Smokey Dives
we would like to point out that
50s Britannia, Trad Jazz Britannia as well as Jazz625) will be
repeated in the night from Friday to Saturday (24./25. May
2013). Trad Jazz Britannia will again be repeated on Monday,
27.05.2013 - please check your TV programme for correct times. |
May 22, 2013
We normally do not publish
concert dates etc. as we have a permanent link to the Chris
Barber Tour Management on this site.
However, we got an
e-Mail from Todd Allen, pointing out to a special event on May
30, 2013 in Basingstoke. This is Todd's e-mail:
Dear
All, SAMMY RIMINGTON is to be reunited with his old boss CHRIS
BARBER for a session in Basingstoke on THURSDAY MAY 30th.
Wally Fawkes was originally due to be working with Chris on
this occasion but now has to have a minor operation. Chris
chose Sammy to replace him. In fact it is a get together for
Chris with a total of 4 of his sidemen, the others being
JOHNNY MCCALLUM (banjo/guitar), VIC PITT(bass) & STICKY
WICKETT(drums). The venue is: THE IRISH CENTRE COUNCIL ROAD
BASINGSTOKE RG21 3DH for more information & booking (tickets
£20) please call Anne or Dave Bennett on 0794 204 0779
WELCOME! |
May 19, 2013
Not many followers of the Big
Chris Barber Band have had the opportunitiy to follow a
concert with the lastest members of the band: Amy Roberts and
Bert Brandsma. Amy is not only a fantastic reed player, but
also very keen on flūte! Actually, she plays the flūte in
C-Jam Blues als well as in When the Saints. Her colleague,
Bert Brandsma is a fantastic reed musician too and he proves
it with a great solo in C-Jam Blues where he plays the bass
saxophone. And finally, we have to point out that Peter
Rudeforth plays the flugelhorn in C-Jam. Why do we tell this?
Bert Brandsma posted a video with
C-Jam Blues on youtube and we think you will be very
interested in watching this video. Thanks Bert. |
May 13, 2013
Karl-Wilhelm Specht has sent
us a lot of photos from the Jazz & Blues Band period. A first
set of pictures can be seen on
our photo-pages. This set includes pictures from a concert
with Ray Nance. |
April 29, 2013
We have added a new band
picture to this website - thank you, Bert Brandsma, for
providing us this actual photograph |
April 28, 2013 - Remembering Pat Halcox
We
have now created a new page "Remembering Pat Halcox" with the
obituary for Pat and the Book of Condolence. Furthermore we
have added a video from John Bennet, that he had recorded at
Pat's funeral. All information will be consolidated on the
page "A tribute to Pat Halcox" |
April 8, 2013
These days we have been
informed by Ed Jackson, co-organiser and co-webmaster of this
website, that due to ill health he is temporarely not in a
position to maintain his work at this website. I'm sure you
all wish him all the best and we hope for a quick recovery.
In the meantime, I will take full responsability for the
development of this website. However, due to business reasons,
I'will not step in until the last week of April 2013.
We
have got quite a lot of new and interesting material that is
waiting for publishing. Especially Karl-Wilhelm Specht from
Germany has sent us rare photographs. Furthermore, we received
a second lot of pictures for the Pat Halcox Photo Archive.
Many thanks to Shirley Halcox for keeping open this fantastic
photographical source of the Chris Barber Bands.
Thank you
for your understanding in this matter.
Andreas Wandfluh
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March 7, 2013
More sad news reached us
this morning. Kenny Ball, British trumpeter and bandleader,
born May 22, 1930, passed away this morning. Indeed very sad
months for European Jazz. RIP Kenny |
February 20, 2013
Helge Lorenz sent us a short video clip from the Brass Band,
leaving the chapel with "When the saints go marching in"
Please note: large file / allow enough time for the download.
Here are two versions:
WMV-version MPEG-version |
February 17, 2013
We received so many requests
from people asking us for information about the Service of
Celebration for the Life of Pat Halcox. Most of these people
were not in a position to come to England. Therefore we have added
a
slide show with pictures from the ceremony, held on Feb. 14th at the
Easthampstead Park Cemetery & Crematorium (a professional
photographer was there and we hope to get these pictures later
on).
Please note: large file / > 30 MB / allow enough time
for the download. Here are the files:
WMV-version
MPEG-version |
February 3, 2013
The menu page of the Chris Barber website has been overhauled to reduce clutter, streamline the page, and make your visit more user-friendly. Probably the most significant change is the reduction of the "CD stack" of links within the site from the previous 30 to 15. All of the old links are covered, but in some cases with new "entry pages". If you have any comments about the new "look", please send an e-mail message to us, or you can post on the Message Board.
Ed Jackson & Andreas Wandfluh, co-webmasters |
January 19, 2013
Petite Fleur is not only
Sidney Bechet's composition or Chris Barber's Jazz Band Hit in
1959 - but also a world champion cocktail!
Read more here. |
January 18, 2013
The
Pat Halcox's Photo Archive
has now been completed with all pictures we have got from Pat.
However we hope that his is only the first set of pictures and
that we will get more photos... |
January 12, 2013
We have placed a permanent link to Pat Halcox's Photo Archive in the "CD stack" of links within the site, higher up on this page. |
January 10, 2013
Not many Chris Barber
Fans know that Pat Halcox was the photographer and photo
archivist of the Chris Barber Bands for a long time. He now
has opened his fantastic photo
archive and we are happy to present the first pictures on
this website. Many thanks Pat, for this, and thanks to Mike
Henry who forwarded these pictures to us. More pictures are
due to come. |
January 9, 2013
New DVD of the Seventies!
The Chris Barber Band with 9 fantastic tunes live at the
Musikladen. See more here... |
January 2, 2013
We are
happy to announce the release of 2 great CD's:
#1:
Chris Barber at the London Palladium - a reissue of the
concert recording of 1961
#2: The third CD of the new Lake
records series: Diamond Jubilee Collection:
Chris Barber Goin' to Town in
Carlisle 1994, featuring the Chris Barber 1994 Reunion
Band plus the Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band on a double CD. |
January 1, 2013 - Happy New Year to all and everybody
visiting this site
The Webmasters, Ed Jackson and
Andreas Wandfluh wish a Happy New Year to all Chris Barber
Fans. We have transferred in November and December 2012 the
content of this website to a new server, allowing us to
concentrate all information, sound files, pictures etc. on one
place. During this period we too have prepared quite a lot of
interesting items for this website - soon to come here!
Best wishes - Ed Jackson and Andreas Wandfluh / co-webmasters |
December 12, 2012
Vocalion announces the
release of a new series of CD's of British Jazz Bands. Vol. 1
features the Chris Barber Jazz Band, Ken Colyer's Jazzmen and
The Mike Cotton Jazzmen. See our review here. |
November 8, 2012
Ferdie Favager, who was a member of Chris Barber's New Orleans Jazz Band in 1950 and 1951, recently passed away. We have posted a page in memory of Ferdie. |
November 4, 2012
Long-time contributor to the website Ivan Spring has let us know about a YouTube posting of the British TV programme, "Lonnie Donegan: This Is Your Life". Click on the links to watch Part 1 and Part 2. |
October 27, 2012
Hold on to your seats, folks! Bert Brandsma has alerted us (via Facebook) of an electrifying video of the 1965 Chris Barber Band playing "The Saints" in concert in East Berlin. |
October 14, 2012
Photos by Peter Rudeforth from a late-2012 European Tour. |
October 12, 2012
Photos (by Amy Roberts) from a Recording Session in September 2012. (The permanent link for this page is at the end of the Tours, Concerts & Special Events page.) |
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Welcome to the Chris Barber Website Message Board.
We hope you will find this a useful and entertaining addition to the site, where you can talk about anything related to Chris, the band, concerts, tours, recordings -- you name it. |
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The fine print: Since January 1, 2004, www.chrisbarber.net has been maintained by Ed Jackson of (Canada), Andreas Wandfluh (Switzerland), and, until his untimely death in 2009, Julian Purser (England). Over the years, many other people from around the world have provided us with otherwise inaccessible material. They are listed on the Credits and Thanks page.
If you have any questions or comments about this website, please click here to send an e-mail message. All enquiries about management, concerts, bookings, etc., should be addressed to Wim Wigt Productions. |
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