Born in 1930,
Chris Barber was one of the leading figures in European jazz. Together with
Kenny Ball and Acker Bilk, he was one of the “Three B’s” who defined
traditional jazz in Britain and spearheaded the “Trad” revival of the late
1950s and early 1960s. His interest in jazz began while he was evacuated from
London during World War 2, and he began collecting 78 records of his American
heroes, becoming an expert on the early days of recorded jazz. He formed his
first band in London after the war, playing a trombone that he bought for £5
from the trombonist in Humphrey Lyttelton's band. His first records were made
at the end of the 1940s, but it was when he and the clarinettist Monty Sunshine
formed a co-operative band in 1953 under the leadership of Ken Colyer that his
career took off.
Colyer’s band
was a byword for New Orleans authenticity, helped by the fact that after
working his passage to the home of jazz the trumpeter had been deported for
outstaying his visa in order to play with the city’s legendary jazz musicians.
In 1954 the band split from Colyer, the remaining five members adding trumpeter
Pat Halcox to the line-up, who was to stay in Barber’s various bands until
2008, their 54-year partnership being unparalleled in British jazz. When the
Northern Irish singer Ottilie Patterson (soon to become Mrs Barber) joined the
band, it hit a winning formula, and moved from small jazz clubs to ever-larger
concert halls, first in Britain, then in Europe, and from 1959 in the United
States. There Barber became known as “the man who brought Trad back to
America”.
Barber had
briefly studied the double bass at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, as
well as trombone, and he played the instrument on his 1956 record of “Petite
Fleur”, featuring Monty Sunshine’s clarinet, which became a chart hit —
reaching no. 3 in the UK and no 5 in the American top 100. It was number 1 in
Sweden for several weeks. There was chart success, too, for the band’s original
banjoist, Lonnie Donegan. He and Barber had often included a short set of
“skiffle” — American country blues and folk songs — in their concert sets, and
their version of "Rock Island Line” released in 1955 was the first debut
vocal recording to become a certified Gold Disc in the UK.
By the time
the Beatles began to transform the landscape of British popular music, Barber
had established himself as a hot property with regular radio and television
shows, but by the early 1960s he had also become a major figure in the blues
revival. Not only had he brought such singers to Britain as Sister Rosetta
Tharpe, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee and Muddy Waters, but he added John
Slaughter, the electric guitarist, to his band, which became the Chris Barber
Jazz and Blues Band. This group never stood still musically and while his
“Trad” compatriots were still playing the traditional jazz repertoire of the
1920s and 1930s, Barber was exploring material by Charles Mingus, John Handy
and Joe Zawinul.
In 1991 Barber was awarded the OBE for his services to music. Barber announced his retirement in 2019, having led a band almost continuously for 70 years. He published his autobiography “Jazz Me Blues” in 2014. After suffering from dementia, he died on March 2, 2021.
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