The 26th annual Upton Jazz Festival - 24.06.2011

I've got to say that though it ain't strictly my bag, I had had a thoroughly pleasant time on the opening night of the 26th Upton Jazz Festival - probably because there didn't seem to be a single trace of the avant-garde free-form version so beloved by the Fast Show's Jazz Club - which was "nice"!

Trad seemed to be the order of the day - and I'd stationed myself behind the Best Of Young Jazz Stage which featured a wealth of young local talent over the weekend. I was tremendously impressed with young saxophonist Benjamin Turner AKA Unlike Jazz's opening set - this lad's a student at Hereford Sixth Form but had only hooked up with with piano-man Jerry a day or so before to do this gig - well you wouldn't have known it!

A quick wander over to one of the five stages at this amazingly popular event for the Amy Roberts Quintet - before another helping of sax talent from Stourport's Tom Leaper.

There was plenty of variety on show - with some old-fashioned rock 'n' roll from the Carl Sinclair Boogie Boys - but I was particularly taken with the final outfit on the Young Jazz Stage - the CNS Allstars from Chipping Norton School. Well if this is what school orchestras are like nowadays then I am gobsmacked! This was a show-and-a-half of reworkings of numbers like Moondance, Tuxedo Junction with Model Pupil thrown in - with tongue-firmly-in-cheek I expect. They closed off with Cee-Lo Green's Forget You to a largely unsuspecting audience I reckon - as for the second week in a row I think I was possibly one of the youngest punters on-site!

Andy O'Hare