May was busy for the Rhythm Section - a bit less so for Sarah who was still in recovery.  We were back at the Casino on 9 May and experimenting with more instrumentals than usual so that Sarah could ease back in gently.  This meant some great stuff like James' arrangements of "A Train" and "Black Orpheus" getting an outing, and Peter throwing in some extra tuba instrumentals on "Georgia" and "Dream A Little Dream" - a number which we can already tell is going to be on the "16 Most Requested" album when Verve gets around to calling us. (NB, Blue Note, you can still get in first, the details are on the contact page!)

Sarah then crawled back among the flannie sheets for a couple more weeks of self-pity and daytime television (not a tautology, but nearly), while the Rhythm Section steamed ahead without a backward glance.  James has now joined Spectrum too, to sub for Adam when the latter is N/A, and part of what this means is that we now have a very cool Spectrum Small Jazz Combo which is essentially FAQ plus Doug Luke on guitar and Mark Levers on drums - and also on occasion Scott Levers on trumpet.  More of which, later.

Between rehearsals for the million gigs Spectrum has coming up, James scored himself a solo gig playing the piano at Government House for a drinks reception for the Red Cross, to great acclaim and a return invitation; and Peter played tuba, timpani and tambourine (and for all we know triangle, tabor, tin whistle and other random and obscure t-beginning instruments) for SUPA's world premiere production of "The Wall".  Yes, the one by Pink Floyd.  (That's a rock band, apparently.  Sarah and James looked it up on Wikipedia.) Peter had to miss opening night for our Casino gig, and it is no secret that the producer said it was the second night that really took the roof off.  By the end of the run the production was playing to completely packed houses, entirely on the strength of the reputation of the tambourine figures.  Or so we heard.

May finished strongly with a double header of a Spectrum Small Combo gig at the Hyatt and the National Big Band Eisteddfod.  The Small Combo on this occasion was FAQ plus Doug, Mark & Scott, and we were in top form, playing for the Hewlett-Packard Ball welcoming Towersoft employees on their merger.  James directed traffic like Bernstein, Doug & Sarah traded Ella quotes, and we all got fed Wagyu veal (except Sarah, who merely sucked on an Anticol ice lozenge in a martyred fashion). The feedback from the client and the crowd was really great, and the only downside of the evening - unless you count the Levers boys being asked for ID, and none of the rest of us - was a nasty accident to the tuba, which found itself breaking the fall of an amp, which in turn was breaking the fall of a bass player whose chair was a bit too close to the edge of the stage - fortunately during set up and not while the party was underway!  The tuba has been commended to the tender ministrations of Dr Dirk at Tritone and we hope to see it recovered in time for Merimbula.  The amp, chair and bass player are all fine.

May closed with a bang, Spectrum taking out the Big Band Eisteddfod held at some club somewhere in the north which Sarah couldn't find if you gave her a map, a Sherpa and a carefully laid trail of shoes and earrings.  Fortunately Peter is not thus handicapped.  James wasn't with us for this one, but the commentator said good things about the performance of the rhythm section generally, in both pieces, and about the vocals on "Too Close For Comfort" - our first public outing of a very nifty Gordon Goodwin arrangement, and a promising omen for the Merimbula Jazz Festival in June.

Which is where we hope to see you next!  Stay tuned for our next report.  In fact, stay tuned whenever possible - James will give you an A if you need it.

April started off well, with a great gig for a Save the Children fundraising dinner at the Goolabri Golf Club, organised by the redoubtable Ruth Tannahill.  Though strongly tempted to bid for an evening with Gary Humphries at the charity auction, we restrained ourselves, as what was supposed to be a 6 - 9 gig crept up to 11pm, such a good time was being had by all.  Especially the table doing synchronised jazz hands to "Bye Bye Blackbird", and the enthusiastic lady who started moving furniture out of the way so everyone could dance, unfortunately while the speeches were still in progress!  It was a very fun gig and a very worthy cause, and not only have we already been invited back for next year, we've been invited to Government House for breakfast (not a big deal for James, but the rest of us are chuffed.)

Things took a slight nosedive after that, with Sarah coming down with pneumonia, meaning we had to cancel our regular Casino gig (thanks to the Brendan Drake Trio for filling in) and turn down a couple of private functions.  Peter managed, as ever, to keep busy, playing with Spectrum for the Jumptown Fall Ball - Sarah was very unhappy to miss that one - and the Beijing Torch Relay - which Sarah was phlegmatic about (pun fully intended) once she discovered it involved getting up at some insane hour and queueing inconveniently for security passes.  James has been able to use the downtime to do his musical director thing and work on some new arrangements, which we're looking forward to trying out soon! 

Unfortunately the new demo recording has had to wait for Sarah's lungs to start functioning again, but we'll keep you posted.  Better health & lots more gigs to come in May!

The buzz continued to build in March with some warm feedback from our friends at Snowy Hydro Southcare, after we teamed up with the incomparable Doug Luke on six strings and the talented Mark Levers for a session under the Spectrum banner for the SHC Open Day.

The opening of ‘The Q’ – the new Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre saw Peter back on bass supporting the Buddy cast in a variety extravaganza to showcase local talent. A great night was surely had by all with some nice crossover for James with the Governor-General officially opening the ‘Q’ on the night.

Peter then steamed through another season of Buddy to excellent houses before FAQ appeared at the Casino on Good Friday.

This was the best gig for the year so far, with a strong turnout of friends and supporters dominating the seating near the Bar and giving the gig a great atmosphere, more like a concert for our friends.

We played a blend of band favourites such as Route 66, along with new material and some reworking of standards including our up-tempo ‘It might as well be spring’ and a new arrangement of My Funny Valentine. We also took requests; it was no hardship to put the perennials Georgia and Autumn Leaves back on the playlist.

Sarah soared through vocally tricky tunes such as Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most and the Dave Frishberg number Sweet Kentucky Ham. My Attorney Bernie, also by Frishberg was a feature for the legally-minded friends there on the night.

Peter reprised his tuba performance with solos on My Baby Just Cares For Me and Is You Is, Or Is You Aint, My Baby’, and James had a great time on keys, working with Peter to support Sarah’s vocals and teasing out the harmonic possibilities in solos on tunes like My Romance and This Can’t Be Love.

All in all a blast of a night and thank you to Susan, John ("Spiro"), Costa, Danny, Will, Tom & Marie, Lydia, Fiona, Jocelyn and Rachel for turning out on an unlikely Easter evening to show your support. We hope you enjoyed the performance as much as we did.

Peter completed his musical Easter by appearing for one night only with Trevor Dunham at that Canberra Easter institution, the National Folk Festival.

Our next casino gig was to be 19 April, but we were able to help out late in March when the KarismaKatz had to pull out due to a dose of (kat?) flu. We hope you recover soon! Doug Luke sat in on guitar as Peter was interstate researching new songs for the repertoire – well actually checking out the new musicals. Much as Sarah and I missed Peter, we had a really enjoyable night playing with Doug to a capacity audience.

Coming next is a benefit performance on Saturday 5 April for Save the Children. Then Sarah and Peter are playing at the Jumptown Jam Fall Ball with Spectrum on Friday 18 April with a possible guest appearance from James on keys in the small combo.

And we are back in the studio soon to produce another demo CD. Let us know if there are any favourite tunes you would like us to lay down for you.

Cheers for now.

Well, its 2008 and the year is already up and running (as is the web site ! Hurrah!)

Following the traditional Christmas slow down and all the necessary excesses that go with it, we played our first gig (at Casino Canberra) on Saturday 12 January. Despite the requirement for a hasty regrouping and, in some cases, the need to become reacquainted with ones instrument, it all went well. The various punters drifted in and out of the Casino ‘lounge’ as they either frittered away their money or rocked on at the Galaxy night club. Several stayed a while to enjoy the music, and were even kind enough to let us know. Unfortunately (or maybe that was fortunately) the group of girls out on a hen’s night could not find anything on our set list to sing along with.

We are back at the Casino, on Friday 22 Feb (9pm to 12am), just by the Main Bar, and yes, you can still hear us from the drinks queue.

Spectrum (Sarah and Peter) and In Full Swing (James) have both recommenced rehearsals for the year and so the gigs are starting to pile up again. Peter assures us he is NOT playing on any of the three children’s shows currently running in various theatres.

Please take time to visit the rest of our new web site, to see up-coming gigs, hear some samples and sign up for e-mail news.

As the web-site is brand new, feel free to send any feedback, or just a friendly message



F.A.Q.