Cerne Abbas concert ...

It was a real delight to be invited back to St Mary's Church in Cerne Abbas after an absence of quite a few years, and a sprinkling of personnel changes in the band have occurred in the interim. We were, as on our previous visit, made very welcome, and even while the band was gently warming up their instruments, we were immediately reminded of the excellent acoustic in this beautiful space - by no means over-reverberant, as is often the case in churches, but with a really warm and intimate sound, and requiring relatively little effort on our part, certainly as far as the frontline were concerned!

It was great to play for such an appreciative audience, who certainly seemed to enjoy our efforts, based on our usual eclectic mix of numbers that - in the main - few other bands play: a little bit of Duke Ellington (East St Louis Toodle-Oo and Old Man Blues), some Jelly Roll Morton (Shreeveport Stomp and Smokehouse Blues), a piece by Freddie Keppard (Love Found You For Me), and Joplin's The Strenuous Life, among others. Of course, being in this fine Church meant that we just had to start and finish with Spirituals, so Higher Ground led us in, and we ended with Changes from our most recent CD, a modern lyric with a particularly appropriate message for the turbulent world of today, based on the melody of What A Friend We Have In Jesus - sung, of course, by our very own blues legend Hamish Maxwell ...

We really appreciated the very kind comments of so many audience members after our concert, also the drinks and homemade 'nibbles' kindly supplied, and we certainly enjoyed playing once more in this fine old Church.Thanks to the organisers for the invitation, and we hope to return again in the not too distant future!