{"id":407,"date":"2019-10-01T13:38:22","date_gmt":"2019-10-01T12:38:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/?p=407"},"modified":"2019-10-01T13:38:23","modified_gmt":"2019-10-01T12:38:23","slug":"radio-presenter-meets-the-bums-at-the-bar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/2019\/10\/01\/radio-presenter-meets-the-bums-at-the-bar\/","title":{"rendered":"RADIO PRESENTER MEETS THE BUMS AT THE BAR"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

PORTRAIT OF THE\nARTIST AS AN OLDER MAN<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Five Bums At\nThe Bar ask Steve Bewick, who, what, when, where and why<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nnaming of his debut novel as A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man, by James\nJoyce, and the references to his own age by today\u00b4s interviewee, perhaps enable\nus to give this article the title we have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Described\non Wiki as a \u00b4Kunstlerroman in a modernist style\u00b4 Joyce\u00b4s book followed the story\nof his fictional alter ego through a religious and intellectual awakening. Throughout\nthe work Joyce references those already referenced in Greek mythology as\n\u00b4craftsmen.\u00b4 The tale is one of questioning and rebellion against the Catholic\nand Irish conventions in which Joyce grew up and thus is a fore-shadowing, in\nthe writing, of what would become the revolutionary literary techniques of\nUlysses in 1922 and Finnegan\u00b4s Wake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nreading some of Steve Bewick\u00b4s response to questions from these five bums at\nthe bar, you may come to think that Steve\u00b4s awakening to jazz was much like\nJoyce\u00b4s intellectual awakening. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Steve\nBewick regularly presents jazz programmes on the radio and occasionally writes\nfor jazz magazines, so the five bums wanted to know WHO<\/strong> are the jazz musicians to have made the biggest impression on\nhim,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b4Undoubtedly\nit was the sounds of Miles Davis in that 70\u2019s period of his, particularly on\nthe Bitches Brew album. The performers on that album became a search list for\nme to find more music and musicians of that jazz fusion period.\u00b4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nfive bums then interrogated Steve about WHAT<\/strong>\nradio programmes he presents and WHAT<\/strong>\nhis audience can expect from those shows?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b4Hot\nBiscuits (on fcum radio on-line) has been my mainstay program for some years\nnow. This is a jazz and improvised music selection. I try to give a range of flavours\nover the lifetime of this music genre. This represents what I would identify as\nbeing six broad periods, including, New Orleans, Big Band swing, bebop, hard\nbop, Avant Garde and today\u00b4s movement into jazz fusion with a whole range of\nmusical influences.\u00b4 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

WHEN, <\/strong>though,did Steve first fall in love with jazz\nand WHEN<\/strong> did he first start\nbroadcasting?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b4Ha,\nha, ha, I fell in love with jazz at the Isle Of White Festival. This was all\nquite accidental. I had gone with the main aim of seeing Jimi Hendrix but slept\nthrough his performance due to an excess of the Broon stuff. My error was\ncompensated, though, when I experienced Miles Davis playing his new jazz to\n100,000 people, My first experience of broadcasting was as a volunteer with our\nlocal hospital radio station. Playing requests whilst introducing jazz into the\ngaps.\u00b4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

WHERE <\/strong>does the\npresenter\u00b4s love of music take him, the five bums wondered, in terms of\nlocations and gigs and where in life has music been important to him?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
STORMZY
Steve Bewick is a new fan<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u00b4Metaphysically music takes me to another place and time; sometimes my past and at other times my future. Music takes me to a place for me to relax in and re-charge the mental batteries of life and its challenges. Physically I love the local jazz clubs in and around Greater Manchester. There is a new and growing jazz scene in London, too, with an exciting new fusion of Jazz\/Hip Hop and Rap. I have only heard it online but would certainly like to see it live. I\u2019m also a new fan of Stormzy following Glastonbury 19.\u00b4Coincidentally that burgeoning London scene was mentioned to Sidetracks And Detours by a reader earlier that same day. That reader, here holidaying from Wales, raved about the artists currently appearing at the Union Hall venue under a jazz banner, telling us to listen out particularly for the Neil Crowley Trio. I\nmust confess to having been totally unaware of the Neil Cowley Trio until their\nname was mentioned in that passing conversation, but on checking them out I\nfound myself wondering what planet I have been living on for the past ten years\nor so. I have learned, much to my chagrin, that The Neil Cowley Trio was\nassembled by Neil in 2006, after he split from a duo called Fragile State, to\nrecord a solo album called Soundcastles. The actual Trio\u00b4s first recordings\nwere cover versions of You Say You Want A Revolution and Revolution Number Nine\nby the Beatles, having been commissioned to do so by Mojo magazine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They have spent the last ten to fifteen years honing their craft, and according to the headline of an article by John Fordham in The Guardian newspaper in October 2016, The Neil Cowley Trio are now \u00b4jazz stars who make pop music of headlong vivacity.\u00b4 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/Guardian.com\/music\/2016\/oct\/28\/neil-cowley-trio-jazz-pop-union-chapel-london-review\/<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nreviewing one of their gigs at Union Chapel, London, Fordham spoke of how Neil\nCowley arguably qualifies statistically as the most listened to pianist in the\nworld and drives a deceptively laid back. His music is often hook-driven but\nis, at other times, as reflective as any cinema score. On the night Fordham was\nwriting about, he reports there were hundreds of people queuing around the\nUnion Chapel venue to witness Cowley\u00b4s \u00b4music-visuals and lights show\u00b4 telling\nhis self-penned science fiction story of Spacebound Apes<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Neil Cowley Trio
a new name to me<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In the same performance, The Neil Cowley Trio also delivered His Nibs, which Fordham said has a \u00b4serpentine, contrapuntal overtow.\u00b4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So,\neverything my neighbour had enthused over, and that John Fordham had written,\nseemed to create an impression of a fusion band of those alchemist-musicians\nthat John Stewart once described as \u00b4people out there turning music into gold.\u00b4\nThe\njournalist offered a caveat at the end of his piece, though, with the\ndisclaimer that \u00b4jazz or improve, it ain\u00b4t,\u00b4 but concluded, instead, by saying\nthat the band\u00b4s \u00b4refreshing eccentricity and big idiomatic sweep puts Neil\nCowley\u00b4s work in a class of one. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sidetracks\nAnd Detours have also recently celebrated the fusion music of bands like\nOrquesta Catacumbia, and only last night we heard the extraordinary sounds of\nveteran flamenco musician Antonio De La Rosa with his new (and still fluctuating)\nline up of Flamenco Fusion. His band, with him leading on classical guitar,\nconsists of a  sensuous sax player, a\nviolin virtuoso, two beat-box players and percussionists and two males and two\nfemales as extravagant backing vocalists as well as a furious flamenco dancer.\nTogether, under Antonio\u00b4s proud even whilst ever watchful eyes, they are\nre-contextualisng the flamenco movement that has been so overwhelmed in the\nview the world\u00b4s tourist industry into a deserved and legitimate part of the new\nworld music order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Steve also referenced Stormzy, another artist who makes new sounds from faint echoes. https:\/\/<\/a>www.youtube.com<\/a><\/strong>\/user\/<\/a>Stormzy<\/a><\/strong>TV\/<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stormzy\nis the professional name of one Michael Ebenazer Kwadjo Oman Owuo Junior, a\nBritish rapper who is certainly creating an exciting new genre.  He first drew attention on the UK underground\nscene with Wicked Skengman, described as \u00b4a series of freestyles over classic\ngrime beats.\u00b4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He\ninitially released Shut Up as a freestyle on You Tube, which went viral and\nreached number eight in the UK charts and he won successive Mobo Awards for\nBest Grime Act in 2014 and 2015 and was named as a Promising Artist on a list\nof BBC Sounds Of 2015. Subsequently his debut album, called Gang Signs And\nPrayer, released in 2017, became the first so-called Grime album to reach the\ntop of the UK mainstream charts and won a Brit award for Album Of The Year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\n2018 Stormzy followed that with his first number one single, and this year made\nthat headline appearance at Glastonbury that so impressed Steve Bewick. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because\nStormzy wore a union jack stab vest, designed by Banksy, at this gig, his\nperformance was received by many as a comment on the frightening rising\nknife-crime levels in London throughout the year. Such political awareness and\nsocial comment has, in fact, been a feature of Stormzy and his work ever since\nhe criticised apparent government inertia in the aftermath of the Grenfell\nTowers tragedy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, <\/strong>all\nacross the arts know Steve Bewick to be so much a Miles Davis fan that it\nseemed appropriate that when he visited us here on Lanzarote a year or two ago he\ncreated his own Sketches Of Spain with a pencil. So our five bums asked him, as\nboth a music lover and a dabbler in other art forms too, WHY<\/strong> art is important to him?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b4Art\nhas always been a pleasure of mine from a young age. Its as old as the sounds\nin the household from the radio and the record player. Gainful employment later\nearned me the money to buy me things to hear, look at and appreciate.\u00b4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00b4However,\nthe time for drawing was misplaced with other new interests of a young man. Now\nI am retired so I have taken the opportunity to re-visit that old love of mine.\nI\u2019m quite pleased with what I have produced after such a long time and I am even\nventuring into a new discipline of digital art. It\u2019s a fusion of pop art and\nimpressionism. These new intellectual adventures let me forget I\u2019m no longer a \u00b4Young\nMan.\u00b4<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whilst\ntelling us he had enjoyed our e-mail interview Steve nevertheless was keen to\nknow the identity of these five bums at the bar to whom we kept referring. I\nexplained they were the epitome of a technique of open questioning I used to\nintroduce to aspirant writers when facilitating creative writing groups. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nwould give my advice added impact by drawing five consecutive, but slightly\ndifferent version of the letter \u00b4w\u00b4 on the board. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One\nwould be lean and pointy, another round and lop sided, one very definitely\nuptight, another round and curvaceous, and the fifth with a very pronounced\ncentre. Each looked like it was the bottom of a drinker perched on a stool in a\npub, but do not be underestimate them. \nThis gang of five bums at the bar will always get their victim to talk,\nas Mr. Bewick has just testified !! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS AN OLDER MAN The Five Bums At The Bar ask Steve Bewick, who, what, when, where and why The naming of his debut novel as A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man, by James Joyce, and the references to his own age by today\u00b4s interviewee, perhaps enable us […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":410,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aata.dev\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}