Simon Savage has offered the BJMC a gig at the Hare and Hounds in Worthing. He suggested that we have only two tutors a term and that we use them to build a repetoir to lead to performance. This is an idea that has already been discussed on previous occassions in the Committee and has been done before when John Bailey used Laurence Jones to tutor the BJMC for a gig at the Brunswick Festival. The current feeling of the committee is that there are already a number of workshops that already do this. Simon D'Souza does it for his sax workshop. Geoff Simpkins runs his Saturday morning groups. And for the more advanced the Sussex Jazz Orchestra is effectively a gigging workshop (debatable?). The BJMC offers a safe workshop format where a variety of tutors bring a diversity of knowledge. This may, and often does, lead to the formation of bands. People may even form bands to perform at these gigging opportunities. Many past BJMC formed bands have performed at the Brunswich festival, including mine. Where tutoring the whole workshop for a gig has been tried in the past it has thrown up a few problems. Many people don't turn up on the day. Some people do not want to perform so stop going to the workshops. The relationship with the tutors changes. The BJMC is a rare, if not unique, learning environment and the view of the committee is that we need to retain the current formula. If you have a different view then please send us your comments below.
Simon ran a great workshop on Tuesday. 27 people turned up for it which meant not everyone got the chance to improvise. However it is the first time that I have heard the BJMC play arrangements at that tempo and sound so tight. It was really good.