It was sad to hear that Chris
Barber, the jazz trombonist and band leader, died aged 90 on 2 March 2021. He
was very influential in developing a version of New Orleans jazz in the 1950s
which led the way to skiffle, British blues, the Beatles and The Rolling
Stones.
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| Chris Barber (Getty Images) |
A few years ago I had lunch with the late Harold Pendleton and his wife Barbara. Harold was a chartered accountant with a love of jazz, and he told me when he arrived to work in London in 1948 from Southport, the first thing he did was to go to Dobells’ Record Shop at 77 Charing Cross Road. He was thumbing through the jazz records and got talking to a man who was doing the same. The man was Chris Barber and Harold became the manager of his band and a lifelong friend. Harold went on to open the Marquee Club in 1958, and he and Barbara organised the National Jazz and Blues festivals held in Windsor and later Reading.
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| Decca Studios, Broadhurst Gardens, (Dick Weindling, 1979) |
There is an important local link between Chris Barber and the Decca Studios in West Hampstead. In the 1950s Hugh Mendl was a senior Decca producer who loved jazz and had heard the new trad bands, such as Chris Barber, at the 100 Club and was keen to record them. But Decca boss Edward Lewis did not see a market for jazz records in the 1950s. He said to Mendl, ‘Give the boy a radiogram’ as if this would impress Chris Barber and gain his loyalty to Decca. Mendl replied, ‘I think he already has one’, knowing that Barber had a huge record collection. Reluctantly, Lewis said Mendl could try one session as long as it did not cost more than £35. Mendl booked a back to back afternoon and evening session at the studios in Broadhurst Gardens.
On 13 July 1954 the Chris Barber’s band: Barber (trombone), Pat Halcox (cornet), Monty Sunshine (clarinet), Lonnie Donegan (banjo, guitar & vocals), Jim Bray (bass), and Ron Bowden (drums), came into Studio Two to record an album with Mendl as the producer and Arthur Lilly as the engineer. By the evening only five tracks had been recorded. Mendl sent the band to the Railway Hotel next door. When they returned, they jammed a track which was called ‘Merrydown Rag’ after the Merrydown cider they had drunk in the pub. Mendl pointed out that they still didn’t have enough tracks for an album. By 9.30 some of the band had left when Lonnie Donegan suggested they could do some skiffle. Chris phoned his friend the singer Beryl Bryden, who lived near Maida Vale, and asked her to bring her washboard and drive to the studios.
For the session Lonnie Donegan sang and played acoustic guitar, Chris Barber played bass and Beryl played the washboard. Mendl was concerned and said to Barber, ‘I don’t want to be unkind, but you’re a trombone player.’ Chris replied, ‘I’ve had three lessons from a classical bass player and I think I can get by.’ This was a joke as Chris had studied the trombone and double bass at the Guildhall School of Music and frequently played bass when the small group played some skiffle numbers.
They recorded ‘Rock Island Line’ and ‘John Henry’ in a few takes and finished by 10.00. Lonnie later embellished the story saying that Mendl didn’t want to record the tracks so they did it in his absence while he had a tea break, which wasn’t true. The Chris Barber album ‘New Orleans Joys’ was released in January 1955. ‘Merrydown Rag’ was issued in December 1954 as a single to promote the album and ‘Bobby Shaftoe’ was released in March 1955. Neither single entered the charts and the album had moderate sales.
In October 1955, the film ‘The Blackboard Jungle’ appeared with teenagers jiving to ‘Rock Around the Clock’ by Bill Haley and the Comets which topped the charts by the end of the month. Someone at Decca (I have never found out who), saw the teenage trend and it was decided to release ‘Rock Island Line’ as a single in November 1955. It began to climb the charts and by January 1956 it had reached number eight. The craze took off and thousands of teenagers quickly formed skiffle bands, including The Quarrymen with John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison.
Following the success of ‘Rock
Island Line’, Donegan fell out with Chris Barber, left the band and called
himself the ‘King of Skiffle’. He had a few more hits such as ‘Cumberland Gap’
and the comedy ‘Does your chewing gum lose its flavour on the bedpost
overnight’, and ‘My old man’s a dustman’. Lonnie died in 2002 and his son Peter
unveiled a plaque for him on the old Decca Studios building on 13 July 2019.
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| Peter Donegan unveiling the plaque (Michael Sharp) |
Actor and local resident, Jim Carter who made a TV programe called 'Lonnie Donegan and Me' was also there. Here is an excerpt of the film:
We have heard that the English National Opera who currently own the old Decca building, are moving back to the London Coliseum and have put the studios up for sale with an asking price of over £10.25 million.
Chris Barber continued to play with a wide range of musicians, and he and Harold Pendleton brought over great US blues men such as Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, and Big Bill Broonzy. The link worked both ways, and Barber began to tour the US from the late 50s onwards. His was the first British group to play on the prime-time Ed Sullivan Show. In 1959 he and Monty Sunshine had chart success on both sides of the Atlantic with their version of Sidney Bechet’s, ‘Petite Fleur’ which sold a million records in the UK. Later Chris worked with Van Morrison, Dr John, Mark Knopfler and Eric Clapton.
John Fordham has written a very good obituary of Chris Barber in the Guardian:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/mar/03/chris-barber-obituary
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