Red Allen Chapters 9 - The Jazz Archive

- 123 -
Henry'Red'Allen at The Manchester Sports Guild
By G.E. LAMBERT
in Jazz Journal, June 1964, p11-13
The Manchester Sports Guild is an
organisation to which amateur sports
clubs in the area are affiliated. It was
formed ten years ago with the primary
aim of raising funds at a time when the
impact of the television age was really
beginning to make itself felt in club
attendances and finances. To most people
in the Manchester area the Guild is best
known for its fine Sports and Social
Centre in Long Millgate, where- the
facilities include a spacious lounge/ bar, a
ballroom – and more to the point here - a
jazz cellar. In April of this year the Guild
celebrated its tenth anniversary by
presenting for four consecutive evenings
the great New Orleans trumpeter Henry
'Red' Allen. The choice of Henry and of
the four bands which accompanied him
was typical of the enlightened approach
to jazz exhibited by the Guild.
The jazz cellar is a long room with a
small bandstand and a copiously stocked
bar. The acoustics are good but not
exceptional and the piano is no better
than the average jazz club standard - i.e.
pretty poor. The audience was attractive
and appreciative and one could
understand why so many well known
jazz personalities from London were
envious of the Mancunians and their fine
jazz room.
After four numbers by the Alex
Welsh band on the Friday evening
Henry Allen made his appearance and
it soon became apparent that he was
playing superbly, maintaining the
standard he set with the Kid Ory band of
1959. He now seems to be playing better
trumpet than at any time in his long and
distinguished career, that is if records are
a true reflection of his earlier work. The
erratic, rather sloppy manner of some of
his playing has been replaced by a
command of the horn which seems
enhanced by the passing of the years.
Although an angular or asymmetrical
phrase some-times gave the music a quite
dramatic effect there was never any trace
of the seemingly deliberate vulgarity of A
Sheridan Square, while his runs were as
unique as ever without the sourness
which was often evident in his playing.
His repertoire over the four evenings was
extensive-really an amalgam of standards
along with numbers associated with his
own career, including Indiana, Rosetta,
Cherry, Yellow Dog Blues, St. Louis
Blues, Biffly Blues, Patrol Wagon Blues,
Spider Crawl, How Long Blues, Who
Stole The Lock?, All Of Me, Tishomingo
Blues, Snowy Morning Blues and a
surprising Sweet Substitute, requested by
the indefatigable Doug Dobell. The vocal
choruses were full of personality and
swing, while in his direction of the
various bands Henry revealed a capacity
for leadership of a rare order. To avoid
the clash of two trumpets Alex Welsh
left the stand for long periods on the
opening night and was able to observe
how well his band responded to the
inspiration and example of the guest. The
rhythm section played well, although not
altogether without the stodginess which
used to be the defining quality of local
rhythm teams. Fred Hunt, a most
excellent pianist, fought manfully with the
piano while guitarist Jim Douglas
provided some pleasant choruses,
particularly on the blues. Al Gay played
good clarinet and better tenor, his solos
on the latter raising quite a few eyebrows
among jazz critics pre-sent, the Freemanlike
buoyancy of his playing being
particularly pleasing. In combination
with Roy Crimmins on trombone Gay
was fine backing Red on the long blues
numbers, their riffing having a swing
which obviously inspired the trumpeter.
Roy was in particularly good form on
this evening and there were moments in
the solos of all the players, including
those of Alex when he returned to the
stand, when the rhythm section eased off
a little and a degree of musical
excellence was reached which was quite
beyond the modest scale of British jazz a
few years ago.
The more variable standards prevai-ling
in the Sandy Brown Band were obvious
the following evening by the end of the
opening set. The rhythm section had a
less organised and alltogether heavier
sound, while Sandy had contributed a
series of solos - including a real gem in
Creole Love Call - which had an
individuality beyond anything heard in
the music of the more consistent Welsh
band. Sandy's solos were equalled in
jazzcraft and intelligence, if not in sheer
personality, by those of Danny Moss. His
inclusion in this unit has been criticised
by some writers but his presence appears
to have encouraged a more free type of
ensemble as well as providing a solo
voice in the same class as Brown. To
play a tenor solo with rhythm in the
middle of a set by a musician of Henry
Allen's stature is to invite the most
rigorous standard of comparison, but Do
Nothing 'Til You Hear From Me was
superb, admirable in construction and
execution and a refreshing contrast to the
more torrid sounds heard before and
after.
These two evenings had demonstrated
the advantages of presenting quality jazz
in a club setting and had revealed that
Henry Allen remains, for all his current
neglect, a very great jazz trumpeter. Yet
on the Sunday evening with Bruce
Turner's jump Band even this standard
of excellence was surpassed. It was
frankly the sort of jazz session which one
never really expected to hear in England,
an evening of easy, relaxed musicmaking
reminiscent of the HarIem
small group jazz of the 'thirties in
which the music had a casual ease, a
consistency of quality and a wide
variety of mood. The rhythm section
played throughout with a swing, a
perfectly judged sense of dynamics and a
relaxation which never wavered during a
long evening's music. The hero of the
session was unquestionably Red Allen,
who played trumpet which surpassed
even his finest recorded performances,
but close behind - and to insert even so
slight a reservation seems ungrateful -
were Bruce Turner and drummer Johnny
Armitage. The way in which the latter
attended closely to the playing of the
group and of each soloist and in which
his alert playing responded to every shift
of emphasis in the music were a constant
delight to the ear. One may have beard
drumming superior to this but never
drumming which was more devoted to
the music as a whole. The three piece
section of unamplified guitar, bass and
drums made a well-knit unit while the
front line of Bruce, Ray Crane and Pete
Strange produced a full and swinging
ensemble. In solo, trumpeter Crane essayed
an Eldridge inclined style while
Strange blew an exciting amalgam of
Matthew Gee, Booty Wood, Al Grey and
Lawrence Brown which was bonded by his
own interesting and developing musical
personality. For years one has admired
Bruce Turner's playing and to hear him
follow an excellent Henry Allen solo in,
say, Rosetta underlined the high standard
he has established. Although one can
detect echoes of the past in Bruce's work
- Pete Brown, Hodges and Parker being
the most prominent - his alto solos have a
very distinct and very appealing
personality, while on clarinet he plays
with a jazz sound which is fast
disappearing on this instrument. The
form and jazz-craft, the fire and swing of
his solos place him very high on any list
of current altoists – his understanding of
the jazz idiom certainly surpasses that of
most of the current public idols and he
uses the language with an ease rare in a
non-American. To such a backing Henry
Allen responded by playing at his best.
The dynamic range used was far
wider than that of any other jazz
trumpeter I have heard; he is capable
of a clear, ringing brass tone which
projects itself with Armstrong-like
majesty and power, while at times he
played so quietly that the tone almost
disappeared, yet so much is this man at
one with his music that this tiny strand
of sound was recognisably Henry
Allen. The elaborate codas bedecked
with unexpected intervals, the unusual
growl effects and very individual
rhythmic approach were contrasting
aspects of a style which was unified by
the intensely personal message of
Henry's music. And message there
was, for through-out this evening the
music 'talked', the wonderful sounds
emerging from the bandstand were a
warm, living reflection of life. The
music was wonderfully flexible in its
emotional range: it had angry
moments, still moments, it reflected
joy, tenderness and a whole host of
other things that one can put names to
but which names never quite express.
It was jazz which was unmistakably
honest and which was unfailingly
musical. On the blues - West End
Blues, How Long, Tishomingo, Patrol
Wagon, St. James Infirmary, - Henry
told a story in a way that is almost
wholly lost among musicians of later
generations. On West End the long note