POETRY AND JAZZ AT THE BELGRADE

 

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In book POEMS FROM POETRY AND JAZZ IN CONCERT by Jeremy Robson, he mentions that in 1961, after an

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initial concert at Hampstead Town Hall and another at the Royal Festival Hall, he was invited to organise a Sunday concert at the Belgrade Theatre, Coventry. "At the Belegrade Theatre (Sunday 25th February 1962), the Michael Garrick Trio, with trumpeter Shake Keane as guest artist, participated for the first time. Arnold Wesker was in the audience and later asked me arrange a series of concerts for his forthcoming Centre 42 Festivals." 

 

Coventry was therefore at the begining of what led to hundreds of Jazz Poetry concerts around the country in the early 60's. This was no small movement - of the Royal Festival Hall gig the Daily Herald wrote "The poets went to the Festival Hall  yesterday, read their poems...and three thousand  people gave them the reception normally reserved for the great names of music. I call that a bit of history!" Audience remained large throughout the country averaging about 400. The early concerts were naturally rough edged but soon assumed a more ''ordered and purposeful shape" with generally four poets reading, two in each half, with specially written interludes of Jazz played as 'bridges' between readers - also a few poems with Jazz.

The Jazz provided a relaxed and unpretentious atmosphere in which 'straight' poetry can be listened to and enjoyed. For the musicians, the advantage is a new and attentive audience. Michael Garrick, the brilliant pianist-composer whose original compositions greatly contributed to the concerts' success, underlined this point in the Poetry Review. "People who love Jazz and hate poetry are learning something new; people who like poetry only, begin to find 'there's something in Jazz' " .. if we've proved nothing else, we have shown that people are not so easily categorised as is often assume. 

Some of the main poets involved include -
Dannie Abse; Thomas Blackburn; Edwin Brock; Pete Brown (who later wrote lyrics for Cream and Jack Bruce); Alan Brownjohn; Michael Hamburger; John Heath Stubbs; Douglas Hill; Anselm Hollo; Ted Hughes; Bernard Kops; Laurie Lee; Chritopher Logue; Spike Milligan; Adrian Mitchell; Dom Moras; Perter Porter; Jeremy Robson; Vernon Scannell;Jon Silkin; John Smith; Stevie Smith; Nathaniel Tarn. 

Excerpts for some of the poems : -   

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The Life We Do Not Lead
The life we do not lead
looks down on us from both these banks and laughs
as Westminster delivers us into this tossing boat;

 

the life we do not lead
has the sleek hulls of ships moored to each bank
strange in our need as women and just as ignorant.
Nathaniel Tarn

THOUGHTS ABOUT THE PERSON FROM PORLOCK
Coleridge received the Person from Porlock
And ever after called him a curse,
Then why did he hurry to let him in?
He could have hid in the house.

 

It was not right of Coleridge in fact it was wrong
(but often we all do wrong)
As the truth is I think he was already stuck
With Kubla Khan.

 

He was weeping and wailing: I am finished, finished,

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I shall never write another word of it,
When along comes the Person from Porlock
And takes the blame for it..
Stevie Smith

NO SENSE OF DIRECTION

I have always admired
Those who are sure
Which turning to take,
Who need no guide
Even in war
When thunders shake
The torn terrain,
When battalions of shrill
Stars all desert
and the derelict moon goes over the hill:

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Eyes chained by the night
They find their way back
As if it were daylight.
Then over, on peaceful walks
Over strange wooded ground
They will find the right track,
Know which of the forks
Will lead to the inn
I would never have found....
Vernon Scannell

Some of these poets read at the Umbrella club or the Lanch and Warwick Arts festivals. Combining poetry and music was a feature of the Coventry music scene in things we organised at the Umbrella Club (The Humpoesic Happening) and the Hobo Workshop both at the Holyhead Youth Centre and the Golden Cross. I would often experiment with playing guitar or working with other musicians in reading my poems or lyrics live. Other poets were experiment ing too albeit not with Jazz. The Liverpool Poets who were often at the Lanch were the inspiration for this and others heard on John Peel's show. When I interviewed Liverpool poets Roger McGough and Brian Patten at Darlington Arts Centre in 1984, they mentioned that they started out experimenting with Jazz and poetry but found that the music and the poetry were often seperate whereas working with musicians like Andy Roberts, there was a sense that the meaning of the poem was important to the musician and working in pop / rock arenas enabled them to reach a wider audience, albeit that the poetry had to be more direct. To read that interview click Interview with Roger McGough and Brian Patten Opposite is a link to Amazon if you want to get a copy of the book.

Pete Brown was a poet but later wrote lyrics for Cream - including White Room featured here. Later he had seveal bands - Pete Brown's Battered Ornament and Pete Brown and Piblokto (for whom Coventry's Bob Jackson played keyboard.)

 

 

 

Poems from Poetry and Jazz in Concert