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*17.04.1930
†02.03.2021
Official Press Release from "TheLast Music Co."
Born in 1930, Chris Barber was one of the leading figures in
European jazz. Together with Kenny Ball and Acker Bilk, he was one of
the “Three B’s” who defined traditional jazz in Britain and spearheaded
the “Trad” revival of the late 1950s and early 1960s. His interest in
jazz began while he was evacuated from London during World War 2, and he
began collecting 78 records of his American heroes, becoming an expert
on the early days of recorded jazz. He formed his first band in London
after the war, playing a trombone that he bought for £5 from the
trombonist in Humphrey Lyttelton's band. His first records were made at
the end of the 1940s, but it was when he and the clarinettist Monty
Sunshine formed a co-operative band in 1953 under the leadership of Ken
Colyer that his career took off. Colyer’s band was a byword for New
Orleans authenticity, helped by the fact that after working his passage
to the home of jazz the trumpeter had been deported for outstaying his
visa in order to play with the city’s legendary jazz musicians. In 1954
the band split from Colyer, the remaining five members adding trumpeter
Pat Halcox to the line-up, who was to stay in Barber’s various bands
until 2008, their 54-year partnership being unparalleled in British
jazz. When the Northern Irish singer Ottilie Patterson (soon to become
Mrs Barber) joined the band, it hit a winning formula, and moved from
small jazz clubs to ever-larger concert halls, first in Britain, then in
Europe, and from 1959 in the United States. There Barber became known as
“the man who brought Trad back to America”. Barber had briefly studied
the double bass at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, as well as
trombone, and he played the instrument on his 1956 record of “Petite
Fleur”, featuring Monty Sunshine’s clarinet, which became a chart hit —
reaching no. 3 in the UK and no 5 in the American top 100. It was number
1 in Sweden for several weeks. There was chart success, too, for the
band’s original banjoist, Lonnie Donegan. He and Barber had often
included a short set of “skiffle” — American country blues and folk
songs — in their concert sets, and their version of "Rock Island Line”
released in 1955 was the first debut vocal recording to become a
certified Gold Disc in the UK. Barber’s abiding interest away from music
was motor sport, and after owning a pair of vintage Lagondas, he moved
into sports car racing, first driving a Lotus Mark IX and then a
prototype Lotus Elite, supplied direct to him by Colin Chapman. He was a
regular figure at UK racing circuits over the years and his band often
played during post-race celebrations at the British F1 Grand Prix. By
the time the Beatles began to transform the landscape of British popular
music, Barber had established himself as a hot property with regular
radio and television shows, but by the early 1960s he had also become a
major figure in the blues revival. Not only had he brought such singers
to Britain as Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee and
Muddy Waters, but he added John Slaughter, the electric guitarist, to
his band, which became the Chris Barber Jazz and Blues Band. This group
never stood still musically and while his “Trad” compatriots were still
playing the traditional jazz repertoire of the 1920s and 1930s, Barber
was exploring material by Charles Mingus, John Handy and Joe Zawinul.
www.lastmusic.co.uk This restless taste for experiment continued, and
his eight-piece band of the 1980s and 1990s, working for much of the
year in Germany and Holland, successfully combined its New Orleans roots
with more contemporary material. Barber himself was a frequent guest
with musicians such as Van Morrison and Jools Holland, bringing his
trombone and enthusiasm into their backing bands in equal measure.
Barber’s final venture was to enlarge his group from the start of the
new century as the Big Chris Barber Band, specialising particularly in
the music of Duke Ellington, which had fascinated him since boyhood, and
which was brilliantly arranged for his line-up by his fellow trombonist
Bob Hunt. In 1991 Barber was awarded the OBE for his services to music.
Barber announced his retirement in 2019, having led a band almost
continuously for 70 years. He published his autobiography “Jazz Me
Blues” in 2014. After suffering from dementia, he died on March 2, 2021.
https://www.lastmusic.co.uk/
Touching
words from Chris Barber's Tour Management
(Ria & Wim Wigt)
The honour to work with Chris Barber and his band presenting his
timeless music worldwide for 50 years.
In 1968, Wim Wigt as a
student organised his first concert with the CHRIS BARBER Jazz and blues
Band in the Netherlands.
From then until 2019 we were able to enjoy
his beautiful music. Resulting in working together on a baffling 15.000
concerts with Chris worldwide.
Creating tours and events. Broadening
the interest for your music. Making jazz available for a worldwide
audience. We inspired each other all these years.
Concerts which were
of an extremely high quality of music. Chris stood for perfection. He
thought about everything. Handpicking the very best jazz musicians and
staff to support him and his band.
We understood each other, we
had the same thoughts and standards in mind. We trusted him to do the
utmost in his professional activities.
He was never ill and made it
to every concert, except the one time he was stranded in the snow on a
German highway, and when he was run over by a male sheep near his home
in England.
Chris was for a 1000% focused on music and his work.
Almost every day during the tours and beyond he would call and email us
to discuss ongoing tours, the business, the records or just to have a
chat.
Also other matters would be discussed - if it weren't cars or
motorracing, it was antiques or economics. Chris was extensively
interested in all of this. We still miss talking to him on a daily
basis.
Together we worked day and night to release many of his
recordings of that period. Offering his audiences a memory of Chris to
take home with them.
In the eighties we, together with Chris, took up
a great project - the Chris Barber Collection -. The Timeless Historical
series in which we both invested all our knowledge of music, together
with a great team of experts. Bringing the jazz from the first
recordings on 78 rpms to the nowadays listening standards by recording
and editing note for note in the spirit of the traditional jazz in its
maiden days. Chris wanted to preserve the music of those early days for
all of us now and in the future. Appreciated by many jazz fans and the
descendants of the performers on these early recordings. Timeless jazz
being preserved forever.
Chris it was lovely to work with you
and we will cherish your legacy forever.
Wim and Ria Wigt
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