Gig - Piers Clark

A new series of Sunday guitar afternoons in the Lansdown Arms is opening with guitar duo Piers Clark and Jason Henson. “We will be playing music from the swing era,” says Clark, who has performed in the same venue before several times, with Mike Piggott. “We’ll be exploring the music of Django Reinhardt, Eddie Lang, Carl Kress, Charlie Christian and other hot musicians of the swing era,” he says. “This was the period between 1935 and 1945, just after the Great Depression, when a new mood of optimism made jazz more popular than ever before. People started to dance the lindy-hop and the jitterbug, Big Bands came to the fore, and singers like Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holliday and Peggy Lee burst onto the scene.”

Most of the music was played by big orchestras, but Clark is confident that two guitars can reproduce the mood. “Swing is about rhythm, and if two guitarists can get that rhythm, then we’re off.” As with most jazz performances, much of the music will be improvised. Eddie Lang is a major influence on Clark’s style: “he was the first great jazz guitarist, before him bands featured banjo instead of guitar. He showed us all the way.” AG