Friday, August 24 marked the beginning of the Rye International Jazz and Blues Festival with free acts around the town as well as paid for concerts with great musicians including Joan Armatrading, Zina McFarlane, Courtney Pine and Ronnie Scott’s Blues Explosion, as well as legend Herbie Flowers.
King Fu Slipper, a six-piece band playing original music, opened with an electric mix of jazz, funk and afrobeat infused with exciting rhythmic and melodic ideas. Playing original music, they excited the audience.
It was impossible to move through the crowd and the stewards tried very hard to protect Rob Smith, BBC1 television presenter, who was interviewing Zana and Herbie, and also exchanging a few words with the locals on the programme. Luckily, the rain held off until near the end.
Monday was the first day of music at every corner of the town. In the Buttermarket, we heard the Rye Bay Crew working hard to be heard over the jazz band Neil Angilley Trio in front of the Kino. Another busy day. The afternoon continued with Joe Corbin, solo songwriter and guitarist, an amazing blues and soul singer, while the Fabulous Red Diesel, as always, drew the crowds in to the Buttermarket.
Sadly, Sunday saw torrential rain but this did not stop musicians and audiences enjoying themselves. In the evening John Crampton with his steel guitar and harmonica set the packed the Waterworks, on the corner of Rope Walk, alight with his slide and steel blues pick. Continuing to the Queens Head in Landgate, the Nampama African band got people dancing. A joyful evening.
Image Credits: Heidi Foster and Kenneth Bird .
Sadly I don’t think having music at the butter market and the Kino works and the jazz and blues festival has become just too big and too organised……we found it impossible to enjoy one band at the butter market because all we could hear was the sound ringing out from outside of the Kino. For the first few years this festival was fabulous……with Fat Tuesday playing all around the town and everyone dancing in the street following them down towarda strand quay. Lots of small bands playing outside various venues were a joy to listen to…..a band called Cockfail Safari who were playing inside the Butter Market, got the chairs folded up so that everyone inside could dance and we had a ball. I do not remember any barriers or stewards as everyone just calmly walked around the town to different venues usually ending up in the Wipers garden for more music. Generally people can sort themselves out and don’t need shepherding around and being refused re-entry when they’ve just left an outside venue for a moment. None of this would be necessary if the two venues weren’t so close or concurrent acts performing.
Ruth you are quite right, I really do not like knocking the organisers,who have put Rye on the map with this wonderful festival, but surely if they had staggered the music at the butter market, and Kino,it would have been better for music lovers all around.
Better still, just have music at the Butter Market rather than at the Kino. It might be an idea for the groups that would play at the Kino to be down at Strand Quay instead….not fair that folk in the Cutadel should have all the fun of the fair.
I agree about the organisers who continue to provide excellent world class acts – fantastic. It is true that the venues are too close but some business owners are reluctant to engage with the festival and allow their premises to be used as venues, so there is a lack of choice for the organisers. When the festival first started (this was the seventh I believe) The George ballroom and The Ypres garden were excellent venues: now not available.
I think the problem at the Kino/Buttermarket was that somehow a heavy rock band was included as jazz and blues and proceeded to blast everything else away … not really a good idea as Rye has plenty of that type of music year long at various pubs – Pipemakers Arms, The Queens Head and now The Cinque Ports.