Tame Valley Stompers – Jazz on a Sunday

Photo: Valerie Bracken

Tame Valley Stompers – Jazz on a Sunday

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Entertainers supreme, The Tame Valley Stompers are always popular visitors and their enjoyment at playing matches the enjoyment of the listeners so much so that after eleven numbers, they realised it was time to end the first set.

Drummer Norman Pennington runs a tight shop and uses his navigation skills to ensure the musicians all arrive at the right place at the right time.

Trombonist Terry Brunt, a master of eccentricity, leads the front line with his usual panache and after a rousing start with “Nobody’s Sweetheart Now” Brunt exclaimed “We’ll Quit While We’re Winning” and then proceeded with a marathon set.

On to “Milneburgh Joys” with solos for trombone, Paul Broomhead’s clarinet and Noel Broadgate’s piano followed by the first blues number, “Riverside Blues” and the first rag with cameo pieces driving “Snake Rag”.

Time for a vocal and trumpeter Roger Wimpenny asked “If I Had My Way” joined by bass guitarist Pete Smith with muted trumpet and mellow trombone.

A samba rhythm arrangement for “Everybody Loves Saturday Night” had Brunt in good voice interspersed with bird calls from the rebellious front line.

A Bechet style “Blame it on the Blues” with Broomhead’s clarinet prominent, switched to the ‘Chris Barber’ rendition of “Chimes Blues” perfectly performed.

The gentle vocal of Broomhead, backed by sweet trumpet, Valente style trombone with an interlude for Broadgate’s piano pondered “When I Get Too Old to Dream” with Broadgate prominent in the inviting “Temptation Rag”, and the band played into the first break with the popular “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot”, with the front line giving a good impression of ‘The Andrews Sisters’.

Returning to the stage in their new psychedelic attire, the gasps were as much for a superb arrangement of “Royal Garden Blues”.

“Pleyel’s Hymn” written at the turn of the twentieth century has always been a band favourite, it has a haunting refrain and as usual Broomhead’s clarinet did it full justice.

Fats Waller’s “Your Feet’s Too Big” had Broadgate’s whimsical homour and piano in full flow with Pennington adding to the mayhem and the march “Washington and Lee Swing” was certainly re-arranged with honky-tonk piano, superb clarinet with Smith adding the vocal accompanied by the Tameside chorale.

Bechet’s “Petite Fleur” a perfect vehicle for the wonderful clarinet of Broomhead silenced the hall, and a breezy cohesive attack on “Black Cat on the Fence” led straight to the bar.

Suitably refreshedm the band went bang into “Hiawatha Rag”, duo for trombone and piano melodious clarinet, heavy bass guitar, all driven along by Broadgate’s rollocking style piano. Trombonist Brunt’s party piece “St James Infirmary Blues” with rhythm accompaniment, his vocal relating the dismal tale, whilst sliding from the heights to the depths brought the house down.

Wimpenny changed the mood with his trumpet leading and vocalising with “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love”.

A crisp front line attack heralded “Climax Rag” with neat tempo changes as the ensemble reached its ‘climax’, and the hypnotic strains of “Dardanella” led by trumpet with solo for piano and neat interweave for clarinet and trumpet brought this fine band to its final number.

To great acclaim, the Stompers played out with “Royal Telephone”, as usual squeezing in mid-number “Putting On The Style” as all the happy faces trooped out into the cold night air.