GREAT JAZZ IN THE HEART OF EAST SUSSEX!
NEXT CONCERT
Friday 10th October 2025 at 7.30pm
Another one-off concert featuring some of the finest jazz musicians in Britain.
Musician bios below – another stunning line-up!
Alan Barnes
Alan Barnes is a prolific international performer, composer, arranger, bandleader and touring soloist. He is best known for his work on clarinet, alto and baritone sax, where he combines a formidable virtuosity with a musical expression and collaborative spirit that have few peers. His range and brilliance have made him a “first call” for studio and live work since his precocious arrival on the scene more than thirty years ago.
His recorded catalogue is immense. He has made over thirty albums as leader and co-leader alone, and the list of his session and side-man work includes Bjork, Bryan Ferry, Michel LeGrande, Clare Teale, Westlife, Jools Holland and Jamie Cullum. He has toured and played residencies with such diverse and demanding figures as Ruby Braff, Freddie Hubbard, Scott Hamilton, Warren Vache, Ken Peplowski, Harry Allen and Conte Candoli.
In British jazz, the young Barnes was recognized – and hired – by the established greats of the time: Stan Tracy, John Dankworth, Kenny Baker, Bob Wilber, and Humphrey Lyttelton. But he is equally respected for his longstanding and fruitful collaborations with contemporaries such as David Newton, Bruce Adams, and Martin Taylor.
Alan Barnes’s unique musicianship, indefatigable touring, and warm rapport with audiences have made him uniquely popular in British jazz. He has received over 25 British Jazz Awards, most recently in 2014 for clarinet, and has twice been made BBC Jazz Musician of the Year. Read more on Alan’s website HERE
Bruce Adams
Early Years
Bruce Adams was brought up in a musical family. His father Bob was a guitarist whose career extended back to the British dance bands of the 1930s and his mother was a dancer.
Bruce’s first real musical interest was the music of Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli. Consequently, Bruce’s first instrument was the guitar. He made the switch to trumpet in 1962 when his father bought him one for his eleventh birthday. Within five months Bruce played his first gig on trumpet.
By the time he was twelve, Bruce was working three to four nights a week in the Glasgow area playing in small dance band residencies and performing in a cabaret act with his father. When he was fourteen he was sponsored on Hughie Green’s Opportunity Knocks by British trumpet legend Nat Gonella.
In 1966 aged fifteen Bruce left school in Glasgow and went on the road with his father starting with a summer season in Brighton and other theatres up and down the country.
Plus hundreds of gigs in northern working men’s clubs as well as Expo 67 in Montreal. Combined Services Entertainment shows in Aden, Malta Libya, and Cyprus, working with Hughie Green and Tony Hancock.
There followed a spell in Cabaret for Cunard and P&O then back on the club circuit.
The Act continued until 1973 when Bob’s health made him give up the business and the act disbanded.
Middle Years
From 1973 onwards, Bruce got involved in the local jazz scene in Glasgow first by forming a jazz quintet with alto saxophonist Bill Fanning, one of the stalwarts of Scottish jazz. Bruce and Bill eventually went to form a big band together. At the same time, Bruce was also playing in the Mecca Ballrooms, first with Benny Daniels in the Plaza then Bill Patrick in Tiffany’s (the old Locarno).
Bruce also joined the big band formed by Glasgow Drum legend George McGowan. The Band entered the 1982 Holsten Big band Competition, where Bruce won the best Trumpet prize and the ‘Oustanding Soloist Prize’. The Judges were Buddy Tate, Doc Cheetham, and Max Jones.
Two years later, the band entered the BBC Big Band competition, and Bruce won the Trumpet Soloist prize.
Bruce at this time was also playing with the Scottish Radio Orchestra and Scottish Dance Band legend Tommy Sampson.
Jazz Festival Years
In the mid-eighties, Bruce was working with singer Fionna Duncan who suggested to Mike Hart, Festival Director of the Edinburgh Jazz Festival that he should use me for the Festival. This resulted in Bruce becoming a regular at the festival for several years. During this period, Bruce worked with Harry Sweets Edison, Warren Vache, and Spanky Davis. Buddy Tate, Al Cohn, Benny Waters, Danny Moss, Bruce Turner, John Barnes Bob Wilbur. Dan Barrett, Roy Williams, George Chisholm, Bill Allred. Dave McKenna, Ray Bryant, Dick Hyman, Art Hodes, Johnny Parker, and Stan Greig.Milt Hinton, Ronnie Rae, Len Skeat, and Dave Green. Jake Hanna and Gus Johnson.
Through the festival, Bruce Joined Mike Hart’s Scottish Society Syncopators. The band toured extensively in Germany, America, and Canada. This resulted in playing at the Sacramento Jazz Festival, Victoria Jazz festival British Columbia, Cork Jazz Festival, Femo Jazz Festival in Denmark, Eindhoven Jazz festival in Holland, and various festivals in Germany. The downside to these gigs is that the band had to wear kilts.
In 1986, the newly formed Glasgow Jazz Festival booked Bruce”s new quartet and asked him to be part of the Benny Carter Big Band featuring some legendary names from different eras of the British Jazz and big band scene. People like Bobby Orr, Tommy McQuater, John McLevy, Brian Rankine, Gordon Campbell, Duncan Lamont, Jimmy Hastings, Andy McIntosh.
In 1990 Bruce was booked for an extensive tour in Germany with Bill Alldred’s tribute to Matty Matlock’s Paducah Patrol Band featuring: Bill and John Allred on Trombone, Bruce, and Tom Saunders on Trumpet/Cornet. Kenny Davern Clarinet/Terry Myers, Tenor Sax/ Danny Moss Baritone Sax, Eddie Higgins on Piano, Marty Grosz guitar, Major Holley on Bass and Warren Sauer on Drums.
This band came together again for festivals in Berne Switzerland and Decatur Illinois.
Bruce has worked extensively in Europe with Pascal Michaux, Charly Antolini, and Pete York, playing clubs and festivals in Norway, Finland, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, France, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Croatia, and Slovenia.
About this time Bruce recorded his first album for Jim Simpsons Big Bear Music entitled “One Foot in the Gutter”. This was followed by The first of several collaborations with Alan Barnes called “Sidestepping”. Bruce and Alan’s next album,” Let’s Face the Music and Dance”. followed about a year later. Both of these albums won CD of the year in the British Jazz Awards. Bruce about this time became part of the reformed Kenny Baker Dozen. For more Albums see discography.
For several years Bruce played the Cat Anderson Chair in Pete Long’s Echoes of Ellington culminating in a tour with the Birmingham Royal Ballet playing the Cat Anderson solo on “The Madness in Great Ones. Apart from being a featured guest soloist with the BBC Big Band, Bruce also worked with the band on a freelance basis, playing for Lennie Niehaus, Gerald Wilson, and Patti Austin. Bruce also played in the Cuban Fire Concert with Horatio el Negra Hernandez and Giovanni Hidalgo.
Bruce has featured as a guest soloist with the following big bands. Fat Chops Big Band, Nottingham Jazz Orchestra, The Scottish National Orchestra Big Band, Bobby Deans Big band Glasgow, Cote Ouest Big Band Nantes, The Hitchen Big Band Nimes. The Midland Youth Jazz Orchestra, The Wigan Youth Jazz Orchestra, The Smokin Big Band Newcastle, and the BBC Big Band.
Bruce’s partnership with Alan Barnes continues to this day with their quintet and many of Alan’s suites for Septet and Octet.
Bruce is a multiple British Jazz Awards Winner, having been nominated more than twenty times.
Bruce’s full bio can be read on his website HERE
Dave Newton
Growing up in Renfrewshire, Scotland, Newton had a musical upbringing with the piano trio sound of Peterson, Tatum or Garner an ever-present feature in the Newton household.
After graduating from Leeds College of Music in 1979 David Newton freelanced around Yorkshire and eventually became a resident musician at the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough for two and a half years. A move to Edinburgh followed where theatre work using local musicians quickly led to an established position on the Scottish jazz scene but after some four years there, his old roommate from college, Alan Barnes, persuaded him to move to London where he rapidly became a much sought after pianist teaming up with Barnes, guitarist Martin Taylor and saxophonist Don Weller.
Newton’s recording career had begun in 1985 with Buddy De Franco and Martin Taylor and his first solo album was released in ’88 in association with producer Elliot Meadow who oversaw the next nine years of recording for Linn Records followed by Candid Records. Once again, in 1997, David Newton and Alan Barnes teamed up and together with Concorde Label agent Barry Hatcher, made four CDs for that label. By 2003, Newton had learned a great deal of the ways a record company operated and he set up a business partnership with former pupil Mike Daymond and they established “Brightnewday Records” initially as a vehicle for Newton’s own music but with an eye to opening up the catalogue to other artists later on.
In the first five years of the nineties, Newton’s reputation as an exquisite accompanist for a singer, spread rather rapidly and by ’95 he was regularly working with Carol Kidd, Marion Montgomery, Tina May, Annie Ross, Claire Martin and of course Stacey Kent, with whom he spent the next ten years recording and travelling all over the world. While all this was going on, Newton was composing music which he would record on his own CDs as well as writing specifically for Martin Taylor, Alan Barnes, Tina May or Claire Martin and Newton’s music can now be heard on many television productions, especially in the United States where over twenty TV movies benefit from Newton’s haunting themes.
David Newton was made a Fellow of Leeds College of Music in 2003 and in 2019, was voted ‘Best Jazz Pianist for the sixteenth time by the Jazz audience of the UK in the British Jazz Awards! Read more on David’s website HERE
Andrew Cleyndert
Born in Birmingham, England in 1963. Andrew took up the double bass at school and turned professional on leaving in 1981. His first professional experience was as resident bassist at the George Chisolm Club in Manchester where he backed visiting Jazz soloists including Americans such as Art Farmer and Joe Newman.
On moving to London in 1982 Andrew quickly established himself as a highly versatile player capable of working in a wide variety of situations. Early tours included working with bands led by saxophonists Bobby Wellins, Don Weller and Bobby Watson, and trumpeters Ted Curson and Red Rodney. He also began working with a string of visiting soloists including Bud Shank, George Coleman, Ray Bryant, John Hicks and Lee Konitz to name but a few as well as working with the cream of London based musicians including broadcasting with the Kenny Wheeler Big Band.
Taking a couple of years out to complete a degree in Maths and Psychology Andrew returned to the jazz scene to become a member of the Ronnie Scott Sextet and Quartet with which he has toured the Caribbean, The Middle East and Europe as well as working at Ronnie Scotts Club in London itself.
The last few years has seen Andrew join the bands of the highly respected Stan Tracey with whom he has already toured Canada and China as well as performing as part of the hand over celebrations in Hong Kong. Andrew has also toured Britain and Europe with the Gene Harris Quartet and worked regularly with the singer Annie Ross. He is also a member of the Bryan Spring Trio, Alan Barnes Quartet and the Don Weller Quartet, and has also worked and recorded with Stacey Kent. He has been nominated for the British Jazz Awards every year since they started. Other tours include working with American piano players Benny Green, Junior Mance and most recently James Williams with drumming legend Ed Thigpen, New York saxophonist Jon Gordon, trumpeter Conte Candoli, and guitarists Herb Ellis and Mundel Lowe.
Andrew has taught on various summer schools including the Glamorgan Summer School, The Jazz Academy at the Royal Academy and the Berkshire Jazz Weekend as well as taking further study himself under double bass soloist Tony Haugham.
Andrew has started his own record label Trio Records (www.triorecords.co.uk) releasing twenty two albums by artists such as Stan Tracey, Junior Mance, Bobby Wellins, Martin Drew, Peter King, Don Weller and Colin Purbrook amongst others.
Steve Brown
He has become one of the most sought after drummers in the country, and since studying in New York in the early 1990s has worked with almost every major British artist, as well as many visiting American musicians, including Harry ‘Sweets’ Edison, Conte Condoli, Benny Golson, Benny Green, Carl Fontana, Barry Harris, Junior Mance, Charles McPherson and John Bunch. Steve is a long term colleague of tenor star Scott Hamilton. His studio credits include albums with Stacey Kent, Dave Newton, Andy Panayi, Karen Sharp and various groups for Alan Barnes’s Woodville label.