UPDATES
Note: Offsite news items are shown with a yellow background, while updates to the website are white.
January 12, 2010
There's a short but important article on a website called Beatles Rarity Of The Week, which talks about the Barber's Band's 1967 recording of Cat Call (released on the Battersea Rain Dance LP), a Paul McCartney instrumental composition that has often been referred to as one of the "songs the Beatles gave away." The article also compares the Barber version with a much earlier Beatles demo, but even more importantly draws a direct link between Chris Barber and the existence of The Quarry Men, who later changed their name to The Beatles: "So if not for Chris Barber, there would have been no stardom for Lonnie Donnegan, no 'skiffle craze' and therefore, no Quarry Men. It’s very arguable that The Beatles, in turn, may have never existed".
January 9, 2010
Today marks the 55th anniversary of Ottilie Patterson's first public appearance with Chris Barber's Jazz Band, at a legendary 1955 concert at the Royal Festival Hall. You are invited to take a second look at a page created to commemorate this event five years ago, and the website's slideshow page, which includes a video about Ottilie.
December 26, 2009
Revisions have been made to the Big Chris Barber Band page and the Former Members of the Band page to reflect recent personnel changes, as well as the temporary line-up of band members for the first tour of 2010.
November 28, 2009
Programme from a 1964 tour with Howling Wolf. (Thanks to Todd Allen and David Booker.)
November 25, 2009
Monty Sunshine's page in the Former Members of the Band section of the website has been updated with links to a previously-posted magazine article and to the slide show posted on November 21.
November 23, 2009
Bernard Flegar's photo album, first mentioned two days ago (see below), has now been posted to Photographs, page 15.
November 21, 2009
A slide show celebrating the years that Monty Sunshine spent with Ken Colyer's Jazzmen and Chris Barber's Jazz Band (1953-1960) has been added to the Slide shows page.

November 21, 2009
Drummer John Sutton has had to take some time away from the band. One of his subs has been long-time Barber fan and professional drummer, Bernard Flegar, who has put together an album of photos on his Facebook page. Bernard has kindly set the access to the album to "Everyone", which means you don't have to be a Facebook subscriber to see the pictures.

Note (Nov 22): It seems that the Facebook page is not accessible to everyone after all. However, Bernard has sent the original collection of photos to me, and they will be added to one of the photos pages on this site in the next few days -- Ed Jackson.

November 14, 2009
New concert DVD: The Big Chris Barber Band In Concert On The Isle Of Wight.
November 11, 2009
Various articles from Melody Maker, 1959, contributed by Gerard Bielderman.
November 5, 2009
Programme from a concert at the Pavilion Theatre, Liverpool, on January 15, 1956 (linked from the Tours, Concerts and Special Events page).
November 2, 2009
Two LPs have been added to Part 2 (1961 to 1968) of The Chris Barber LP Collection, and there are corresponding new tracks on the Music Clips page.
October 31, 2009
Three LPs have been added to Part 1 (1953 to 1960) of The Chris Barber LP Collection, and there are corresponding new tracks on the Music Clips page.
October 29, 2009
Part 2 (1961 to 1968) of The Chris Barber LP Collection has now been posted. It includes such classic albums as Barber At The London Palladium, Good Morning Blues, Battersea Rain Dance, and a rare France-only issue, Dans Le Vent.
October 21, 2009
American jazz record producer, Grammy winner, and author (Bessie, a biography of Bessie Smith), Chris Albertson runs Stomp Off in C, which has to be one of the best jazz websites in the world. A very young Chris Barber features in a recent post entitled "London 1953: Melly, Mick, and the Moo Cow Milk Bar".
October 21, 2009
There is an excellent and informative article about Alex Revell, clarinettist in Chris's amateur band in 1951 and 1952, on Ian Maund's Sandy Brown Jazz website, which is well worth a visit and prolonged exploration.
October 19, 2009
Watch Chris Barber featured in concert playing Stormy Monday with Eric Clapton & Friends on YouTube.
October 8, 2009
Ingemar Perup of Uppsala, Sweden, has contributed eight great photos taken at the band's concert on October 6, 2009.
October 1, 2009
British music journalist and BBC Radio producer John Pidgeon has written two outstanding articles about the emergence of the British Blues movement in the 1950s and 1960s, both of which acknowledge and affirm Chris Barber's central role. Eventually we hope to reproduce both articles on the Chris Barber website; meanwhile, you can read them at Rock's Back Pages, under the titles, "Blues Incorporated: How British R&B Trashed Trad" and "Chris Barber: Father of British R&B".
September 18, 2009
New CD on Lake Records: Sonny, Brownie & Chris.
September 5, 2009
The Chris Barber LP Collection is the beginning of what we plan will become a long-term, detailed and complete archive of the history of the Chris Barber Band on LP records.
August 16, 2009
A "Former Member of the Band" page for original drummer Ron Bowden.
August 15, 2009
Pat Halcox continued to play occasional gigs after he retired from the Barber Band in July 2008. Here's a YouTube video from Zurich: Pat with the Harlem Ramblers at their 2008 Christmas Party.
August 8, 2009
On August 6, 2009, Chris took part in an hour-long phone interview on Angel Radio, a web-based radio station located in Havant and aimed at senior listeners in Britain and around the World. The programme is reproduced on the Barber website by permission of Angel Radio and presenter Pete Cross.
August 4, 2009
A direct link to the Music Clips page has been added to the graphic on the menu page which shows links to the main sections of the Barber website.
August 1, 2009
The Sister Rosetta Tharpe concert tour (1957) programme page now includes autographs and a concert ticket.
August 1, 2009
The link to The Chris Barber Band, 1954 to 2009: Fifty-five Years of Musical Milestones -- a page to celebrate the 55th anniversary of the founding of Chris Barber's Jazz Band in May 1954 -- has been moved to the Feature Pages section of the Chris Barber's Jazz Band/The Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band page.
July 30, 2009
At long last, Chris Barber fans can watch the classic film, Momma Don't Allow, which was made in 1955 and has only been shown on rare occasions in theatres. It features the original Chris Barber Band of 1954-55, and has been referred to as the most authentic film of its kind, capturing the atmosphere of a mid-50s jazz club. You can watch the film here: www.channel4.com/fourdocs/archive/momma_dont_allow_player.html; and read more about its background here: www.screenonline.org.uk/film/id/439003/. (Thanks to John Westwood for the tip about these links.)
July 30, 2009
Ken Colyer's Jazzmen, 1953-54, and Chris Barber's Jazz Band, 1954-57, Featuring Ron Bowden: This is a short slide show prepared for Ron Bowden's "Former Members of the Band" page, which is not yet ready for viewing. The slide show has been finished, so it has been added to the Slide Shows page.
July 24, 2009
Boaters, Bowlers & Bowties: The Best Of Barber, Ball & Bilk is a new 2-CD box set featuring some of the best-known recordings by the Barber, Ball and Bilk bands of the late 1950s and early 1960s.
July 22, 2009
Two recent photographs of John Crocker with the Ken Colyer Legacy Band.
July 20, 2009
The Big Chris Barber Band 2009 in Israel: On June 20th, 2009 the Big Chris Barber Band flew in to Israel for a concert at the Caesarea Jazz Festival. Bas Meijer, light engineer of the Big Chris Barber Band, took very interesting pictures not only from the Jazz event, but also from a short trip to Jerusalem.
July 19,2009
Four music clips from the experimental and controversial Drat That Fratle Rat! LP from 1971 have been added to the Music Clips page.
July 14, 2009
Impressions of JazzAscona 2009: Using photographs taken by himself and Bas Meijer, Andreas Wandfluh has compiled an excellent gallery of close to 100 images of JazzAscona 2009. The pictures can be viewed in gallery format as well as in a slide show.
July 14, 2009
We normally don't link to videos on YouTube because of their possible copyright violations and no guarantee that the postings will be permanent. Here is an exception, however: a short documentary about JazzAscona2009 which includes a short interview with Chris Barber and an excerpt from one of the Big Chris Barber Band's performances at the festival.
July 7, 2009
Here's a relatively old item newly added to the Chris Barber website, copied from the Sweet Papa Lowdown website: In 2000 and 2002 Chris Barber travelled to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, to perform and record with the Vancouver band Sweet Papa Lowdown. These sessions culminated in the excellent CD, One Of Your Smiles. On this page Jeff Shucard, leader of Sweet Papa Lowdown, tells how the collaboration came about.
July 6, 2009
Mike Henry's photos from JazzAscona, 2009.
July 6, 2009
JazzAscona 2009: Andreas Wandfluh writes about the three days he recently spent at the 25th annual JazzAscona Festival in Switzerland.
July 3, 2009
John Slaughter has very kindly donated a photo of himself and Steve Hammond. You can view the picture at the bottom of Steve's page in the "Former Members of the Bnad" section of the website.
July 2, 2009
There is an excellent article about Alex Revell -- who was the clarinettist in Chris Barber's amateur bands in the early 1950s -- in the July 2009 edition Ian Maund's web magazine site, Sandy Brown Jazz.
July 2, 2009
A Chris Barber-Related Item for Sale on eBay (June 2009): This is an historical curiosity rather than strictly an item from the Barber-Purser archives, but nevertheless we thought it might be interesting to fans: the sale (for charity) on eBay of one of the bikes used by a racing team sponsored by Chris in the 1960s.
June 23, 2009
Announcement of a forthcoming concert: Barber, Ball and Bilk together in London on July 23rd, 2009.
June 13, 2009
In Memory of Julian Purser: A page to commemorate Julian Purser, who was Chris Barber's archivist and discographer, and, from the beginning of 2004, one-third of the Chris Barber Website & Archives Team, which manages this site.
June 9, 2009
All of the slide shows on the Slideshows page now have additional Flash versions as an alternative viewing format.
May 27, 2009
The Chris Barber Band, 1954 to 2009: Fifty-five Years of Musical Milestones -- a page to celebrate the 55th anniversary of the founding of Chris Barber's Jazz Band in May 1954.
May 15, 2009
Cover pages for two rare Chris Barber recordings: Gabadella Jazzband Med Chris Barber (LP) and Trad Tavern (CD).
May 11, 2009
Todd Allen, who is half of the management team for the website to commemorate Cyril Davies, has written to say that there is a rare photograph of Lonnie Donegan and Ron Bowden accompanying Big Bill Broonzy on a French website about skiffle.
May 9, 2009
Barber At Blenheim is the most recent recording by The Big Chris Barber Band.
April 21, 2009
The great Barbican Blues double-LP from 1982 has now been re-issued on Lake Records LACD273. Read about this new release on the cover page for Barbican Blues.
April 9, 2009
Julian Purser, who was Chris Barber’s archivist, co-discographer, and an integral part of the management of the Chris Barber website, has died after a long illness. Julian was a fan of the band for more than four decades, and it was as a result of his frequent visits to the Marquee Club in London in the early 1970s that he offered to take care of a mass of disorganized memorabilia that otherwise might have been discarded. Over the past thirty-five years Julian added many rare Barber-related items to this archive, as well as amassing his own impressive and enviable collection of Barber vinyl records, tapes, and compact discs. He also joined forces with well-known Dutch discographer Gerard Bielderman in compiling a comprehensive, accurate, and detailed discography of the Barber catalogue. Julian attended what must have been hundreds of Chris Barber club dates and concerts, several of which included such memorable events as the “great reunion concert” held at the Fairfield Hall in 1975, Chris’s seventy-fifth birthday concert in Liverpool, and the Lonnie Donegan memorial concert, which took place at the Royal Albert Hall. On top of all this, in recent years Julian occasionally travelled with the band, most notably to Denmark to hear them play with a symphony orchestra, as well as a memorable trip to Switzerland. Julian thoroughly enjoyed being “on the road”, and these and several other occasions are described in detail in Julian’s own words in various pages within this website, to which his contribution, since becoming a member of the three-person “website team” in 2004, was immeasurable. Julian was a good friend, an infectious enthusiast for all sorts of jazz – Chris Barber’s brand above all – and tireless in his enthusiasm for and efforts towards chronicling the career of one of Britain’s greatest musicians.
Ed Jackson and Andreas Wandfluh
April 3, 2009
On one of the Big Chris Barber Band's recent European tours, trumpeter Mike Henry took some video and photographs on the scenic 30-km leg of the trip from Chur to Arosa, in Switzerland. You can see some of his results at On The Road In Switzerland.
March 28, 2009
Chris Barber Face To Face With Rick Wakeman
Chris Barber's appearance on Rick Wakeman's new television series, Face To Face With Rick Wakeman, is now available for purchase download at RockOnDigital.com.
March 26, 2009
Thanks to Danny Rouwenhorst, there is a scan of a rare Dutch version of the EP, Barber Plays Spirituals.
March 25, 2009
Dipping back into the past, we now have cover pages for Chris Barber's first 12-inch LP, Echoes Of Harlem (1955) and two related compact discs, Chris Barber At The BBC, Volume1 and Volume 2 (recorded in the early 1960s).
March 21, 2009
Cover page for the 1960 LP, Chris Barber Bandbox Volume 2: Elite Syncopations.
March 17, 2009
When Courtney Met Chris
BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 on Saturday 20 June at 8pm, with a shortened repeat following on Monday 22 June at 3pm. This programme will explore Chris Barber's seminal role in the development of music in Britain. It will look at Chris Barber's career as a whole, but focus particularly on the period in the late 50s/early 60s when Chris and his band invited and played with the likes of Muddy Waters, Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, and Sister Rosetta Tharpe. It will also focus on how this influenced the British Blues explosion and discuss the experiences of those artists, the audiences, and the reverberations this had in the jazz world. The programme will be presented by Courtney Pine.
March 13, 2009
Thanks to Wilfried Wittke, the Sennheiser audio company has recently sponsored the band with a complete set of new microphones.
March 13, 2009
The latest in the Lake Records series of chronological CDs from the 1950s, Chris Barber 57-58, is now available.
March 6, 2009
Thanks to Keith Payne of Aylesbury, an unpublished photo of Monty Sunshine's Jazz Band in 1962 has been posted on Monty's page.

March 5, 2009
Thanks to Todd Allen of the Cyril Davies website, here is a news item from the Sandy Brown Jazz website, run by Ian Maund:

BFI Mediatheque - Momma Don't Allow
It is perhaps worth reminding people of information originally sent to us by Anne Hudson about the Mediatheque at the British Film Institute on London's South Bank where the 1954 Karl Reisz / Tony Richardson 22 minute film 'Momma Don't Allow' can be viewed free of charge. The film was shot over nine Saturdays at Wood Green Jazz Club and features the Chris Barber Band at the time of Monty Sunshine, Lonnie Donegan and Ottilie Patterson. It's a great short film that really captures the atmosphere and audience at the Club.

The Mediatheque is a separate room at the BFI (near the Festival Hall and Hayward Gallery). It has a number of computers with fairly large screens each with its own comfortable single or double seats. You are given headphones when you go in and instructions on how to use the computers. You plug in (there are facilities for two people to watch at the same time) and choose the piece of film you want to watch. It is a very pleasant experience, a great resource and the staff are most helpful. You can book your computer in advance or just turn up and hope one is free. For more information click here. 'Momma Don't Allow' is also on a DVD set called 'Free Cinema' available from the BFI.

March 5, 2009
Radio documentary about Sister Rosetta Tharpe:
Ben Williams of the Blues Legacy record label writes:
"They have now broadcast this 1 hour documenary which Chris kindly contributed to. It went out of BBC Radio 2 last night. However, you can listen online by clicking the link below (Chris comes in approx 38 mins): www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/documentaries/shoutsistershout.shtml. Perhaps you would put a link to our online store so fans can get a reminder that the Lost & Found Volume 1 CD features Sister and Chris. The link is www.classic-media-group.com/classic-direct/cd/cd-details.php?product=27"

Programme synopsis:
Ruby Turner tells the extraordinary story of the guitar playing Gospel singer, Sister Rosetta Tharpe. She was one of the most innovative Gospel musicians of her time. In her music you can hear Blues, R 'n' B and Rock 'n' Roll and is cited as an influenced for likes of Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard. When she married 20,000 people attended the wedding in a baseball stadium, yet when she died she was buried in an unmarked grave. Ruby Turner charts her rise to fame and popularity and subsequent demise, as white musicians began to imitate her guitar playing and Mahalia Jackson was promoted by Columbia records to be America's first gospel singer.

March 4, 2009
Chris Barber will soon be appearing on Rick Wakeman's Face To Face, a new television interview series due to be broadcast on television stations around the world and on the World Wide Web.
February 17, 2009
Reedman Richard Exall has set up his own web page at JazzClarinet.co.uk. Make sure you follow the links there to some more information about Richard, as well as to Richard Exall's Shooting Stars, whose front line consists of Richard together with fellow Barber Band members Peter Rudeforth, John Service, and John Sutton.
February 13, 2009
At long last, there is now a covers page for one of the most important CDs in the Chris Barber catalogue: the two-disc compilation, The Complete Decca Sessions. This is quite an elaborate page, including covers of many of the other records on which the tracks have appeared, several music clips, and a video of a 78 rpm copy of Chimes Blues being played on an antique wind-up gramophone.
February 6, 2009
One of the first items to be posted on this site in early 2004, Brian Rust's 1957 booklet, Chris Barber: A Biography, Appreciation, Record Survey, and Discography, has been re-scanned.
February 5, 2009
The latest record cover to be posted is one of the oldest in the Barber catalogue, an EP of 1951 recordings called Chris Barber: Not In Hi-Fi.
January 30, 2009
Andreas Wandfluh was at a recent concert by the Big Chris Barber Band in Zug, Switzerland. He has posted a small gallery of sound-check photos (which can also be viewed as a slide show) on his own Barber website.
January 29, 2009
Acker Bilk celebrated his 80th birthday yesterday, the first of the "Three Bs" (Kenny Ball, Chris Barber, and Acker) to do so. A tribute to Acker has recently been published in The Guardian, and there is another on the "This Is Bristol" website.
January 27, 2009
Matrix Jazz Record Research Magazine, December 1956: Contains of discography of Chris Barber records up to July 1956.
January 21, 2009
On the 19th of January, Chris unveiled a stone in the pavement in the centre of Enkhuizen - a real jazz town in the Netherlands - on the Jazz Walk of Fame.
January 16, 2009
Alan "Sticky" Wicket was a two-time occupant of the drum chair in the Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band: from 1988 to 1990, and then from 1994 to 1998. Fans who remember his dynamic playing will be interested in Sticky Wicket's own website.
January 13, 2008
A music clip and links to additional photos have been added to Zoltan Sagi's page, as well as to Peter Rudeforth's page.
January 13, 2009
A page for Johnny McCallum, who played banjo and electric guitar in the Chris Barber Band between 1974 and 1994.
January 10, 2009
The Chris Barber Band: Tour Programme, 1979 or Early 1980s. This is a 28-page full-colour programme, with photographs plus text by Miles Kington and Humphtey Lyttelton, in both English and German.
January 7, 2009
Richard Exall: NOT with the Big Chris Barber Band -- a tongue-in-cheek pair of photos about one band member's activities when not on the road.
December 31, 2008
Rick Wakeman Face To Face with Chris Barber: a video excerpt of 2 minutes and 35 seconds.
December 25, 2008
Hans Barth, of Grijpskerke, Holland, writes, "It is a long time ago that I was able to send you some “Chris Barber” information from Holland. But the following text may be interesting for the website. Since 1999 Dutch Radio 2 has published the top 2000: this list of the most popular songs between the fifties and now is the result of listeners’ votes. This year marks the tenth top 2000, and this time the list has been assembled by the disc jockeys. At number 1914 we see Chris Barber’s Jazz Band with Ice Cream. Chris stands between the Kinks (Dead End Street) and Crispian St. Peters (Pied Piper). The second recording of Chris we find at number 1740, Petite Fleur, just between Robert Palmer (Every Kinda People) and Bronski Beat (Why). There are no other jazz records in the list, not even the Dutch Swing College Band, the most famous Dutch old-style jazz band. So this is something to be proud of! It is a pity that Lonnie Donegan is not to be found in the top 2000. (P.S., if you want to look at the list, go to www.radio2.nl)."
December 18, 2008
The latest Hot Jazz Channel show (www.radiojazz.co.uk) is even more international than usual featuring bands and musicians from new fewer than six different countries. Representing the USA are the Galvanised Jazz Band with Roy Rubinstein, Wild Bill Davison's This is Jazz All-Stars, Leon Oakley & the Delta Stompers, the Banjo Barons Ragtime Band and the George Lewis Band with Elmer Talbert and Kid Howard. From the UK come the Humphrey Lyttelton Band, Richard Leach's 7 Stars of Jazz, Bob Wallis's Storyville Jazzmen, pianist Neville Dickie and the Chris Barber Jazz Band. France is represented by Paris Washboard and the late Jacques Gauthé. From Scandinavia are New Orleans Delight with Brits Brian Carrick and Derek Winters whilst the Hot Five Jazzmakers hail from Canada. The show's finale is by the Netherlands' brilliant Circus Square Jazz Band. The Hot Jazz Channel show's producers John Booth and Brian Harvey would like to wish all their listeners and supporters a very happy holiday season and a peaceful, healthy and prosperous New Year.
December 18, 2008
Thirty-five years after her passing, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, the pioneering gospel musician and instrumentalist, and one of the most influential musicians to tour with the Barber Band in the 1950s, finally has a gravestone marking her resting place at Northwood Cemetery in Philadelphia.
December 18, 2008
Two new tracks have been added to the list of recordings on the Pat Halcox Tribute Page and the Music Clips page.
December 15, 2008
Pat Halcox was the guest of the Harlem Ramblers at their Christmas Party in Zurich on December 13. Two photo galleries have already been posted: first, on the Harlem Ramblers' own website, and second, on Andreas Wandfluh's site.
December 10, 2008
Four new tracks have been added to the list of recordings on the Pat Halcox Tribute Page and the Music Clips page.
December 1, 2008
Photo Gallery: The Big Chris Barber Band In Meppen, November 2008. (Photographs by Helge Lorenz).
November 27, 2008
A Swedish article from the magazine Red Hot Rock is aimed at publicizing the Blues Legacy Lost & Found CD-set, and includes an extensive interview with Chris.
November 25, 2008
Thanks to Jürgen Stoever, a new gallery of photos, The Chris Barber Band in Krefeld, 1973, is now posted on the website. These photographs were among the first taken after Johnny McCallum joined the band.
November 25, 2008
A new photo of the 2008 Chris Barber Six-Piece Band is posted on the menu page.
November 18, 2008
Andreas Wandfluh attended two Barber concerts in Switzerland in early November. He has created two photo galleries from the hundreds of photos he took on those occasions. Click on the links to see Andreas's photo galleries from Aarberg and Schaan.
November 18, 2008
There is a small gallery of photographs taken during the band's concert in Dortmund that was recently broadcast on radio station WDR4. (This link is added here by kind permission of WDR4).
November 18, 2008
"The Surprising Mr. Sunshine" -- Photos and an article from a British teen magazine, 1962, at the height of the British "trad boom."
November 15, 2008
Andreas Wandfluh, who is one of the three members of the Barber website and archive team, is an avid collector of memorabilia about the band. Here are three of his most recent acquisitions, associated with performances in November 2008.
November 14, 2008
Pat Halcox's many fans will be delighted to hear that Pat will be playing with The Harlem Ramblers in Switzerland on 13 December 2008.
November 14, 2008
Andreas Wandfluh's photo of the current line-up of the band has been added to the Evolution of the Band page.
November 12, 2008
Julian Purser, official archivist of a vast collection of memorabilia about Chris Barber and the Band, has been collecting material for about 35 years. On this new page you can view some of his recent acquisitions, ranging from one of the oldest items in the collection (a concert programme from 1952) to the newest (an excerpt from the 2008 Gillingham Festival programme, at which Pat Halcox played his last concert as a permanent member of the band).
October 17, 2008
Ottilie Patterson: A slide show tribute to the greatest of all British blues singers, Ottilie Patterson, who joined Chris Barber's Jazz Band on January 1, 1955.
October 14, 2008
The Big Chris Barber Band On The Road, September 2008: A gallery of 36 informal photographs by Zoltan Sagi of the band on tour and relaxing between and before gigs.
October 13, 2008
Please note: The subscription to the Pat Halcox message board will expire on November 10, 2008, so please post your messages before that date. All new messages will be added to the end of the Pat Halcox Tribute Page.
September 27, 2008
Photographs of the Big Chris Barber Band in Dortmund, Germany, August 2008, by Dörte Ritter.
September 26, 2008
The link to the Pat Halcox Tribute page has been moved from the top of the Menu page to the "CD-links-buttons".
September 24, 2008
The Chris Barber LP Collection is a new slide show added to the Slideshows page.
September 19, 2008
The Chris Barber EP Collection is a new slide show added to the Slideshows page.
September 10, 2008
The last of seven galleries of photographs by Prisca Gasparoli has been added to Photographs page 14.
September 9, 2008
Two more galleries of photos by Prisca Gasparoli have been added to Photographs page 14.
September 7, 2008
Click here to view the first four of seven galleries of photographs of the Chris Barber Band, 1968-1972, by Prisca Gasparoli.
August 22, 2008
Three small individual items have been added while the website has been down: concerts tickets from Berlin in 1959 and 1961; cover for a fairly rare German 7-inch single vinyl record; and a photo (on the Discography page) of Barber discographer Gerard Bielderman with Pat Halcox, taken shortly before Pat retired.
August 15, 2008
Tony Carter has written an entertaining and informative memoir about how he first started playing, and his seven years with the Big Chris Barber Band.
August 13, 2008
Chris Barber's page in the Big Chris Barber Band section of the website has been updated and a few new photos have been added.
August 8, 2008
Peter Rudeforth has sent a nice photo of himself with Pat Halcox; the photo is linked to Peter's page.
August 8, 2008
The Big Chris Barber Band, 2000 To Today page has been updated to reflect recent personnel changes.
August 6, 2008
Three Photographs from Epe, July 2008, by Dennis Dekker.
August 6, 2008
Trumpeter Mike Henry has posted a couple of videos of the Big Chris Barber Band appearing on Jools Holland's TV show, Later: Jubilee Stomp and Gin House (with Andy Fairweather-Low).
August 5, 2008
The slide show mentioned in yesterday's update is now available.
August 4, 2008
There is now a detailed account, with photographs and a (forthcoming) slideshow, of the band's July 25 concert in Edinburgh.
August 1, 2008
Following the departure of Pat Halcox and Tony Carter from the Band, their replacements are Peter Rudeforth on trumpet and vocals and Zoltan Sagi on reeds. Peter and Zoltan played their first date with the band on Wednesday 23 July in Macclesfield, and their second at the Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, at the band's concert to lead off the 2008 Edinburgh Jazz and Blues Festival. Two members of the Chris Barber website and archives team (Julian Purser and Ed Jackson) were in Edinburgh for the gig, and will be updating the site and adding new material over the next couple of weeks to reflect the new personnel changes.
July 18, 2008
The Slideshows page has been substantially revised, and Flash versions of each show are being added to make viewing easier for those visitors to the site who cannot easily view .wmv files. (There are six flash versions so far, with more to come.)
July 17, 2008
Tony Carter, who was a member of the reed section of the Big Chris Barber Band since its inception in 2001, left the band on the same day as Pat Halcox (July 16). You can find his page in the Former Members of the Band section of the website. All the best to Tony for your future both inside and outside of music.
July 15, 2008
There is a very good gallery of photos from a concert on July 12, 2008 at www.pbase.com/z900/chrisbarberepe. (Thanks to Helge Lorenz for the information).
June 26, 2008
A page featuring Chris Barber: 50 år med en levende jazzlegende, a Danish book by Søren Vind and Jack Thimm, which covers the entire history of the Chris Barber Band, up to and including the first couple of years of The Big Chris Barber Band. Well-illustrated with many rare photographs and a comprehensive chart of changes in band membersip.
June 26, 2008
Keith Scott, blues pianist with Cyril Davies from 1958 to 1963, and a member of the band that backed Jimmy Cotton on his two EP recordings with Chris Barber, has contribued a detailed reminiscence of his days with Blues Incorporated on the Cyril Davies website.
June 25, 2008
John Westwood was the drummer in one of Chris Barber's first amateur bands. John shares his reminiscences of the earliest days of British traditional jazz in Some Recollections from the Days of a Mis-spent Youth.
June 22, 2008
Pat Halcox played his last date in Switzerland with the Chris Barber Band yesterday. Andreas Wandfluh has created a photo gallery of the event, which can also be viewed as a slide show. Click here to go to Andreas's page.
June 12, 2008
Several of the slideshows have been converted into a format that should make them more easily accessible to Mac users.
May 29, 2008
After a considerable delay, there is now a "covers page" for the Lost & Found 3-CD set. The page includes links to press articles and reviews, as well as short excerpts from several of the tracks (which have also been added to Music Clips on the Barber Website).
May 27, 2008
The Chris Barber Archives and Website Team has prepared two items to celebrate Pat Halcox's fifty-four years with the Band: A special "A Tribute to Pat Halcox" page, and a Message Board.
May 21, 2008
The Lost & Found CD set has received uniformly favourable reviews in the British and North American press. The review by Jim White, "A historic legacy of the blues", in today's Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, is one of the most knowlegable and comprehensive.
May 18, 2008
The slideshows page now includes a slideshow about Mike Henry.
May 12, 2008
There is now a special message board where you can post messages to Pat Halcox, share reminiscences, and so on.
May 11, 2008
Announcement of Pat Halcox's farewell tour (see the top of the menu page).
May 7, 2008
The Big Chris Barber Band at Swinging-Hannover, 2008: Photographs taken by Helge Lorenz at an outdoor concert.
April 30, 2008
Several updates to the website, using recent photographs provided by Andreas Wandfluh:
April 29, 2008
Click here for some great concert photos of the Barber band at Jazzfest Gronau 2008.
April 28, 2008
Here's an item for Chris's Dutch fans: an article from Block magazine about the Lost & Found series of CDs.
April 28, 2008
There are some great informal club photos of the band here.
April 21, 2008
Cover of the rare 12-inch bootleg vinyl LP, Muddy Waters in Concert, 1958; this is the version that came out on Krazy Kat Records in 1982.
April 20, 2008
The Big Chris Barber Band in Switzerland: Photographs by Andreas Wandfluh taken at a concert in April 2008, set to music excerpted from the recent DVD, As We Like It.
March 31, 2008
Thanks to Keith Scott, we now have scans (plus some related material) of the two EPs that Chris Barber recorded in 1961 with Jimmy Cotton and members of Alexis Korner's Blues Incorporated: Chris Barber Presents Jimmy Cotton and Chris Barber Presents Jimmy Cotton 2. There are also two associated items linked to the From the Archives page.
March 30, 2008
Short excerpts from four of the tracks on the new Barber DVD, As We Like It, have been posted on the Music Clips page, and detailed information about the DVD can be found on the As We Like It cover page as well as on the New and Recent Releases page.
March 22, 2008
Several videos related directly or indirectly to the Barber Band have been posted on YouTube. Among the most notable are a two-tune excerpt from 6.5 Special, a BBC-TV programme that looks as if it was originally broadcast in 1957, and a fascinating conversation between George Melly and Ken Colyer. There are quite a lot of other Barber-related videos on YouTube, which you can find by searching for Chris Barber, Ottilie Patterson, Lonnie Donegan, Ken Colyer, and so on.
March 17, 2008
Prompted by the release of the recent Lost & Found CD-set, Owen Adams has written an excellent article on The Guardian's theblogmusic site about the importance of visits to Britain by Muddy Waters and Sister Rosetta Tharpe in the late 1950s.
March 16, 2008
Andreas Wandfluh, one of the three members of the 'team" which maintains this website, has posted photographs of the Band in concert and rehearsal in Lucerne, Switzerland, on March 13th on his own website: The Big Chris Barber Band in Lucerne, 13.03.2008. Also, thanks to Andreas, photos of new trombonist John Service have replaced the temporary ones that have appeared here since John joined the band several weeks ago.
March 12, 2008
There's a good article on The Independent website about Humphrey Lyttelton's retiring as the host of The Best of Jazz on BBC Radio 2.
March 10, 2008
Alex Hosking of Australia has provided us with scans of an autographed ticket from a concert he attended in 1957.
March 6, 2008
The Chris Barber Band, 1964 to 1968: the fifth in a series of pages about particular line-ups of the band.
March 3, 2008
Canadian blues guitarist and trumpeter Jeff Healey, with whose band the Jazz Wizards Chris Barber recorded the CD It's Tight Like That three years ago in Toronto, died yesterday at the age of 41. Tributes have been posted at:
  • www.harpmagazine.com/news/detail.cfm?article=12337
  • jaajaakoom.blogspot.com/2008/03/jeff-healey-dead-at-age-41.html
    • February 27, 2008
    Two documents from the Barber-Purser archives giving detailed accounts of the band's Second North American Tour from September to November, 1959.
    February 18, 2008
    Visit the Official Blues Legacy website and the new Blues Legacy page on the Chris Barber website.
    February 18, 2007
    Read the first review of the Lost & Found 3-CD series of blues masters recordings from Blues Legacy on the Music-News.com website.
    February 11, 2008
    New format for the Links to various sections of the website, plus some minor tweaking to the layout of the Menu page.
    February 9, 2008
    There is a very appreciative essay about the 1961 Ian Wheeler-Joe Harriott duet on 'S Wonderful at wwwoldfogey.blogspot.com/2008/02/s-wonderful-meeting-of-opposites.html.
    February 7, 2008
    Dates for performances in March and April have been added to the On Tour page.
    January 31, 2008
    Promotional video for the As We Like It DVD.
    January 29, 2008
    Trombonist, arranger, and Ellington scholar Bob Hunt has left the band, and is being replaced at the beginning of February by John Service. We wish Bob all the best for the future, and welcome John to the band.
    January 28, 2008
    Advance promotional materials for the forthcoming As We Like It DVD and the 3-volume Lost & Found CD & Download series. You can pre-order the DVD and CDs for delivery one week before the UK release date at www.classicdvdshop.com.
    January 27, 2008
    A new Big Chris Barber Band DVD, As We Like It, and a set of three CDs, the Lost & Found series, are set to be released in the near future. You can watch a promotional video for the Lost & Found CDs on YouTube.
    January 24, 2008
    "The Demon Barber of British Blues": Article published in Record Collector magazine, January 2008.
    January 8, 2008
    You can find dates for 13 performances in the southern part of England in February on the On Tour page.
    January 8, 2008
    A new slideshow has been added to the bottom of the Slideshows page: Chris Barber on Compact Disc, featuring the covers of new CDs and CD reissues, plus music from 1953 to 1957.
    January 5, 2008
    Richard Exall's page has been updated with a biography which Richard himself has written for us.
    January 1, 2008
    Today marks the 53rd anniversary of Ottilie Patterson's joining Chris Barber's Jazz Band. Go to Pages You May Have Missed to see the page that celebrated the 50th anniversary in 2005.
    December 26, 2007
    Thanks to Alan Grubb, we now have scans of a four-page programme from a very early concert -- December 1950 -- by the Crane River Jazz Band and Chris Barber and his New Orleans Jazz Band.
    December 19, 2007
    Chris has provided a photo, plus some notes, of him and pianist Jack Honeybourne, taken at a street parade in Covent Garden in June 2006.
    December 15, 2007
    In addition to an overhaul of the appearance of the Menu Page, a new feature has been added, called Pages You May Have Missed.
    December 15, 2007
    Newspaper reviews of a concert by Van Morrison with Chris in the band, and Nick Lowe's new CD, on which Chris is a featured guest.
    December 15, 2007
    Announcement of a new double-CD reissue, Just About As Good As It Gets.
    December 13, 2007
    Will the "Trad Jacket" make a comeback? Is this the perfect gift for Christmas? We report, you decide.
    December 12, 2007
    On November 24, Chris talked to John Hellings on BBC Radio Hereford & Worcester. A large part of this conversation covered the early days of the band, the split with Ken Colyer, and the beginnings of skiffle.
    December 7, 2007
    Article from Blues In Britain, December 2007.
    December 6, 2007
    Article from The Southern Daily Echo, 5 December 2007.
    December 6, 2007
    On December 2, Chris appeared on Helen Mayhew's show on theJazz, talking about his career and choosing representative recordings to play along with the conversation. Only the conversation is available here on the Chris Barber site, on the In His Own Words page.
    December 6, 2007
    Continuing his series of appearances on BBC regional radio stations, Chris joined Walter Love's show, Jazz Club, on BBC Radio Ulster on December 2, 2007. The conversation is posted on the Barber site on the In His Own Words page.
    December 2, 2007
    Programme from a Concert in Brighton, August 1956.
    December 2. 2007
    Tour Programme: Jazz Scene 1957. This programme is particularly interesting as it contains long essays about Big Bill Broonzy and Brother John Sellers, plus a shorter piece about the Barber Band, as well as brief items about Mick Mulligan's Band with George Melly, and Ken Colyer's Jazzmen.
    November 30, 2007
    Chris on Keith Warmington's programme, BBC Radio Bristol, November 21, 2007.
    November 26, 2007
    Article from The Worcester News, 23 November 2007.
    November 24, 2007
    Review of Pete Frame's book The Restless Generation: "How rock music changed the face of 1950s Britain".
    November 23, 2007
    Programme from a concert in Brighton, July 1957.
    November 20, 2007
    Roger Day of BBC Radio Kent chats to guests from the last 50 years of popular music each evening. Click here to listen to an interview in which Roger talked to Chris on 14 November.
    November 20, 2007
    Programme from the Beaulieu Jazz Festival, 1961.
    November 18, 2007
    Toni Ginsel has posted some excellent photos of the Big Chris Barber Band in Stuttgart, November 7, 2007, on his own Chris Barer website at www.tonis-records.de/ChrisBarber_Concerts_2007-Stgt.htm.
    November 16, 2007
    Clips from the British music press: Can't Stop Now and the forthcoming Blues Legacy "Lost & Found Series".
    November 15, 2007
    Photographs by Andreas Wandfluh of the Big Chris Barber Band in Aarberg, Switzerland, on 9th November 2007.
    November 9, 2007
    Programme from the Chris Barber Show, 1957.
    November 6, 2007
    The Case for the NJF: A leaflet published by the National Jazz Federation in 1958.
    November 2, 2007
    Programme from a UK tour by Sister Rosetta Tharpe, the Chris Barber Band, and Ottilie Patterson in April 1960. This copy of the programme was autographed by all members of the band, Ottilie, and Sister Rosetta.
    October 25, 2007
    BBC Music Magazine's review of the new Barber CD, Can't Stop Now.
    October 25, 2007
    Three tracks from the LP & CD Elite Syncopations have been added to the Music Clips page.
    October 12, 2007
    Twelve new tracks have been added to the Music Clips page, including some rare comparisons between alternative versions of the same tunes recorded in 1964 and 1965.
    October 7, 2006
    There is now a page about the "Chris Barber Archives and Website Team".
    October 5, 2007
    Chris's New CD, Can't Stop Now, due for release next week in the UK, has received a plug and a good review in the October 3rd edition of All About Jazz.
    September 22, 2007
    Photographs page 12 has been added to the site, featuring contact sheets of pictures taken around the end of 1960.
    September 22, 2007
    Although it is not an addition to the Barber website as such, historically-minded Chris Barber fans will enjoy reading his recollections of the influential British blues harpist, Cyril Davies.
    September 13, 2007
    Chris Barber's Jazz Band with Ottilie Patterson, 1961 to 1964: the fourth in a series of pages about particular line-ups of the band. The page includes an introductory text, photos of the band and individual members, selected record covers from the time, and a partial list of tracks recorded then (including links to about three dozen audio clips).
    September 11, 2007
    A link to a very early (1952) British jazz concert programme is shown close to the top of the Tours, Concerts and Special Events page.
    September 10, 2007
    16 more photographs from the Barber-Purser archives at the bottom of Photographs, page 11.
    September 3, 2007
    A few photographs have been added to Photographs page 11.
    September 2, 2007
    Press releases announcing the re-issue of Chris's Can't Stop Now CD and a forthcoming Blues Legacy CD series, Chris Barber Presents...
    September 2, 2007
    On Thursday 30th August, 2007, the Big Chris Barber Band filmed a live concert at Shepperton Studios. Click here to view a copy of Julian Purser's invitation to this exclusive event, plus a set of photographs provided by Ben Williams of Classic T Studio, the company which is re-issuing the band's recent CD, Can't Stop Now.
    August 19, 2007
    Nine tracks have been added to the Music Clips page, linked to an under-construction page for the 1961-1964 Chris Barber Band.
    August 19, 2007
    More covers have been added to the Thumbnail pictures page.
    August 11, 2007
    The Individual Covers Pages section of the site has been re-designed, and about a dozen covers have been added to the Thumbnail pictures page.
    August 6, 2007
    Thumbnail pictures of about 260 covers from LPs, CDs, EPs and single 45-rpm records.
    Note: This is a new version of the previous thumbnails page. It differs from the previous one in that the new graphics are almost twice as large as the previous ones and are therefore much more readable. Since we chose a minimum size and resolution for the scans to be included on the new page, some of the old scans don't appear here. We plan to replace them at a higher resolution in the near future.
    July 22, 2007
    An electric night: Brian Harvey's personal account of the break-up of Ken Colyer's Jazzmen and the beginning of Chris Barber's Jazz Band in 1954.
    July 19, 2007
    Programme from Cavalcade of Jazz, a 1956 concert sponsored by Nixa Records.
    July 3, 2007
    You can now rapidly find everything on the Chris Barber website by going to Search the Chris Barber website close to the top of the menu page.
    June 29, 2007
    A few photographs from the Barber-Purser archives have been added to the bottom of Photographs, page 11.
    June 21, 2007
    Details for two new CDs, Chris Barber 1956 and the Lonnie Donegan Jubilee Concert of 1981 are available on the New Releases page and the Record Covers page.
    June 17, 2007
    The Big Chris Barber Band, 2000 to Today: a detailed page showing changes in the band over the last seven years through photographs, CD covers, and music.
    June 9, 2007
    Photographs of Muddy Waters, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, and Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee.
    June 5, 2007
    A humorous and informative article from the National Jazz Archive Newsletter, October 2006.
    June 5, 2007
    The Chris Barber Band visits the army, 1967.
    June 5, 2007
    Two publicity postcards -- one from the 1950s, the other from 2006.
    June 4, 2007
    Programme from a Royal Festival Hall Concert by Chris Barber's Jazz Band and the Dutch Swing College Band, 1958.
    June 2, 2007
    Regretfully, we have closed the Chris Barber Guest Book because of an excessive amount of offensive messages and other spam. However, the Message Board is still up and running.
    May 28, 2007
    Ottilie Patterson Publicity Booklet, early 1980s.
    May 27, 2007
    Programme from Rhythm With The Stars, a 6-day package tour of Northern England in March, 1956.
    May 24, 2007
    Programme from a 1959 UK tour by the George Lewis New Orleans Jazz Band.
    May 22, 2007
    Poul Villum of Denmark has sent a set of photographs from a 1960 concert in Aarhus.
    May 19, 2007
    The collection of Chris Barber Club booklets is now complete, with the correction of some previous errors and the addition of Volume 2, Number 5 (thanks to Ivan Spring) and Volume 4, Number 2.
    May 16, 2007
    Programme from the Lonnie Donegan Tribute Concert, 2004.
    May 16, 2007
    Miscellaneous tour and concert posters from the 1990s and 2000s.
    May 11, 2007
    Concert Programme: Brighton, Friday, 25th January, 1957.
    May 8, 2007
    Mike Snelling's page has been expanded with an autobiography, a music clip, and links to some of Mike's own recordings before joining the Big Chris Barber Band.
    May 7, 2007
    Two items have been added at the bottom of the Archives page.
    May 6, 2007
    A slideshow of The Big Chris Barber Band in Zurich, 28 April 2007: Photographs by Andreas Wandfluh; Music from the CD, Can't Stop Now.
    May 2, 2007
    One of the oldest and rarest items on the entire Chris Barber website: a three-page programme for a concert at Birmingham University in 1952.
    May 2, 2007
    The Behind the Scenes page has been updated to welcome new lighting engineer, Bas Meijer, and expanded to give a short account of the vital work that Bas and sound-man Barry Walker do to make sure each performance runs smoothly.
    May 2, 2007
    Toni Ginsel has posted some excellent photographs on his Chris Barber website of last week's concert in Heidenheim.
    April 28, 2007
    1959 concert programme.
    April 27, 2007
    Added a Monty Sunshine concert ticket and authograph to a page featuring drawings by Monty. (Donated by Bill Bibby.)
    April 20, 2007
    The Instrumentalists and Band Evolution pages have been updated to include recent personnel changes in the band.
    April 20, 2007
    The Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band, 1979 - 1986: the third in a series of pages about particular line-ups of the band.
    April 15, 2007
    A new page of photographs (page 10) has been added to the site.
    April 10, 2007
    Unfortunately, the new Chris Barber CD, Can't Stop Now, doesn't include any recording or personnel information, but Julian Purser has provided us with discographical details.
    April 5, 2007
    The classic Colyer and Barber LPs from 1953 and 1954, New Orleans To London and New Orleans Joys, have recently become available on a single CD.
    April 5, 2007
    Individual cover pages have been added for two new CDs: That Patterson Girl and Can't Stop Now. And, just to refresh your memory about the various sections in the Chris Barber website, appropriate updates have been made to the cover thumbnails page, the new and recent releases page, and the music clips page.
    March 25, 2007
    A slideshow for Ian Wheeler has been added to the website.
    March 15, 2007
    Can't Stop Now, a new limited edition CD by the Big Chris Barber Band with special guest Andy Faiweather Low, has recently been released. Details will follow soon on the New and Recent Releases page.
    March 15, 2007
    Bass player Dave Green, who joined the band in January as a temporary replacement for Vic Pitt, is now a permanent member of the band. A page for Dave will be posted soon in the Big Chris Barber Band section of the website.
    March 12, 2007
    A page to celebrate the 26 years that Ian Wheeler spent with the band.
    March 8, 2007
    Several new tracks have been added to the Music Clips page.
    March 5, 2007
    Pat Halcox's account of the band's third tour of North America in October and November of 1960.
    March 4, 2007
    Three photographs of Chris and Ottilie at Silverstone, 1959. (Thanks to David Drinkwater.)
    March 4, 2007
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 6, No. 12: Monty Sunshine's replacement on clarinet, Ian Wheeler, is introduced in this issue.
    March 2, 2007
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 6, No. 11. This edition is particularly noteworthy for a long account, by Pat Halcox, of the band's third North American tour. It was also the last edition to be published before Monty Sunshine left the band.
    February 17, 2007
    Sixteen photographs by Andreas Wandfluh, taken at a concert in Schaan on 10 February 2007.
    February 13, 2007
    We have added an archive of the Chris Barber and Pat Halcox 75th Birthday Guestbooks.
    February 12, 2007
    Toni Ginsel has posted some great new photos of the Big Chris Barber Band in Ludwigsburg on 4 February on his own Chris Barber website.
    February 9, 2007
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 6, No. 10.
    February 4, 2007
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 6, No. 8.
    January 26, 2007
    Four concert and tour programmes from the 1950s and 1960s.

    January 22, 2007
    After thirty years with the Barber Band (and close to twenty years with Kenny Ball before that!), bassist Vic Pitt has decided to retire. We are sorry to see Vic leave, as he has been such an integral member of the band for so many years. Thanks, Vic, for your wonderful music. We wish you all the best in your retirement, and in whatever endeavours, musical or otherwise, you are planning for the coming years. So far, a permanent replacement for Vic has not been chosen. Meanwhile, well-known British bassist Dave Green, who has played and recorded with such jazz luminaries as Humphrey Lyttelton and Michael Garrick, among many others, will be subbing on bass.

    January 16, 2007
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 7, No. 4.
    January 12, 2007
    The Evolution of the Band page has been completely overhauled, with exact dates for personnel changes, plus scans of most of the recordings made by each line-up of the band.
    January 12, 2007
    New band member Mike Snelling now has his own page, plus some photographs have been added to Richard Exall's page.
    January 12, 2007
    Chris Barber fans who had the pleasure of seeing and hearing Andy Fairweather Low in concert with the band on its Christmas 2005 UK tour will likely be interested in Andy's new CD.
    January 2, 2007
    Over the last couple of weeks, formatting changes have been made to several sections and many specific pages throughout the site. In addition, we have taken this opportunity to add new material, most notably scans of original LP covers and sleeves notes on several of the Covers pages (e.g., New Orleans Joys, Chris Barber International, and Chris Barber Bandbox, Volume 3, Best Yet.)
    December 24, 2006
    Birmingham Concert Programme, 1957
    December 17, 2006
    "Jazz at the Marquee" Programme, 1958.
    December 14, 2006
    Photograph of John Mayall, Eric Clapton, and Chris.
    December 13, 2006
    The Band Evolution page ("From Ken Colyer's Jazzmen to the Big Chris Barber Band") has been re-formatted, and improved by adding record and CD covers to each line-up of the band. (You can find this new page and the one shown immediately below listed on the Jazz Band / Jazz and Blues Band page.)
    December 13, 2006
    A special page for the 1956 lineup of Chris Barber's Jazz Band, with photographs, record covers, and music clips.
    December 9, 2006
    John Defferary has recently retired from the band after eight years in the reed section. We hope to have information soon about his replacement, Mike Snelling, which will be posted via the Big Chris Barber Band page.
    December 9, 2006
    An update and a few minor corrections to the Music Clips page.
    December 7, 2006
    Concert Programme: "The Chris Barber Show 1957"
    December 2, 2006
    A slideshow tribute to Ottilie Patterson.
    November 25, 2006
    Programme from a UK tour by "The Three Bs" -- Ball, Barber and Bilk -- in 1985.
    November 25, 2006
    Programme from the band's first solo concert at the Royal Festival Hall, 28th April, 1956.
    November 24, 2006
    A slideshow of the Big Chris Barber Band in Hamburg, November 2006: photographs by Helge Lorenz.
    November 18, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 6, No. 5 and Vol. 6, No. 6.
    November 16, 2006
    Programme from a late-1980s tour -- lots of colour photographs and information about the 1986-1988 lineup of the Chris Barber Jazz and Blues Band. The entire text is in English and German.
    November 14, 2006
    The Chris Barber website was recently featured in Record Collector magazine.
    November 13, 2006
    There is a new photo of Barry Walker on the Behind the Scenes page.
    November 13, 2006
    Added a photograph of the band's most recent line-up (thanks to Helge Lorenz) and updated the Band Evolution page.
    November 13, 2006
    Article from a German newspaper, October 2006. (Thanks to Gerd Jordan).
    November 2, 2006
    Some information about the band's newest member, Joe Farler, has been added.
    October 29, 2006
    Article from a German newspaper, October 2006. (Thanks to Toni Ginsel).
    October 21, 2006
    Details of the newest Chris Barber CD, Folk Barber Style. The CD has also been added to the Covers page, and the Music clips page has been updated.
    A special page for the 1986-1988 lineup of the Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band, with photographs, some CD covers, and music clips.
    October 14, 2006
    Programme from a BBC Concert at the Royal Albert Hall, 1958.
    October 6, 2006
    A slideshow of the Big Chris Barber Band in Germany and Sweden, 2006: photographs by Helge Lorenz and Kjell Wiklund.
    October 1, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol 6, No. 3.
    September 29, 2006
    Personnel change: Joe Farler has replaced Andy Kuc on banjo and guitar.
    September 29, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 4, No. 1. [Please see the thread titled "Chris Barber Club booklets" in the Message Board.]
    September 26, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 5, No. 8.
    September 26, 2006
    Programme from a tour of Switzerland in 1960.
    September 26, 2006
    Programme from a concert in Glasgow, 1961.
    September 26, 2006
    Three items from Jazz News, 1958.
    September 26, 2006
    Programme from a tour of Denmark in 1958.
    September 15, 2006
    Details of the newest Barber CD from Lake Records, Chris Barber 1955.
    September 14, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 3, No. 3.
    September 13, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 3, No. 2.
    September 13, 2006
    Chat room added.
    September 12, 2006
    Photo, article, and a short introduction by Chris about a New Orleans Jazz Parade in Covent Garden, June 2006.
    September 9, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 3, No. 1.
    August 30, 2006
    Here are 21 scans of photographs from the Barber-Purser archives.
    August 18, 2006
    The Instrumentalists pages are now complete, with individual pages for each instrument, plus Ottilie Patterson, as well as guests with the band.
    August 18, 2006
    About two dozen more clips have been added to the Music Clips page since the last update two weeks ago.
    August 11, 2006
    Here's another slideshow, this one to celebtrate the year 1954.
    August 4, 2006
    The Music Clips page is now up to date. Future additions of music to the site will be added to this page.
    August 3, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 2, No. 8.
    July 29, 2006
    Two new slideshows have been added to the Slideshows page. The first features Chris Barber's Amateur Bands, 1949-1952, while the second focusses on two versions of Petite Fleur, recorded in 1956 and 2002.
    July 28, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 2, No. 7 .
    July 22, 2006
    Announcement of Chris being awarded an honororay degree of Doctor of Music by Durham University.
    July 22, 2006
    There is now a slideshows page, currently featuring four short slideshows.
    July 21, 2006
    Here's another slideshow, this one about New Orleans Joys and Echoes Of Harlem, and featuring Chris talking about the making of the latter LP.
    July 21, 2006
    Added the slideshow at the top of the menu page. Click here to view a full-screen version.
    July 17, 2006
    Our plan to post all of the Chris Barber Club booklets from the 1950s and early 1960s continues with Vol. 2, No. 3.
    July 15, 2006
    I've been experimenting with slide shows while on vacation. Here's a first attempt at combining some of Chris's words with pictures and music --1953-1954: Ken Colyer's Jazzmen. (Please note that the slide show may take some time to load.)
    June 24, 2006
    Two CDs have been added to the Covers page, Symphony Of Jazz and Great Moments With Chris Barber.
    June 20, 2006
    Winners of the second Chris Barber Competition announced.
    June 17, 2006
    More music has been added to the Music Clips page. Also, you might want to check out the Chris Barber record covers page, to which several covers have been added over the last few months. Finally, the results of the Second Big Chris Barber Band Competition will be announced during the next few days.
    June 10, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 6, No. 7.
    June 3, 2006
    Concert Programme from a Tour of West Germany in 1961
    May 27, 2006
    Announcement of the Second Big Chris Barber Band Competition
    May 27, 2006
    Photographs of Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee added to the Sonny, Brownie And Chris cover page.
    May 27, 2006
    More music added to the Music Clips page.
    May 22, 2006
    Index of all the music clips on the Chris Barber website. [Please note this list is not yet complete: more will be added as time permits.]
    May 20, 2006
    Cover page for Sonny, Brownie And Chris, a rare 10-inch LP record from the 1950s.
    May 14, 2006
    Programme from a concert tour of the UK in 1964. This page also includes excerpts from two tracks recorded by the band in the same year.
    May 10, 2006
    The Jeff Healey/Chris Barber CD has been added to the individual covers pages, with some scans of the jewel box inserts.
    May 6, 2006
    Announcement of a new CD release, It's Tight Like That, by Jeff Healey & The Jazz Wizards, featuring Chris Barber. Go to the New and Recent Releases page for details.
    May 1, 2006
    Photographs from a concert in Kaarst on Pat's birthday, 2006.
    April 14, 2006
    The Big Chris Barber Band Climbs Mountains! -- A diary of the road crew battling snow and ice to get to the next gig, by Julian Purser.
    April 10, 2006
    A new review of an old LP record, Jazz Lips, recorded mainly in 1962.
    April 2, 2006
    Sheet music for Revival and Lonesome, with 60-second excerpts from each recording.
    March 27, 2006
    The Instrumentalists section of the website continues with a feature page on The Trumpeters.
    March 25, 2006
    Article from a British blues magazine, 1988, featuring an interview with Chris Barber.
    March 18, 2006
    The Instrumentalists section of the website continues with a feature page on The Drummers.
    March 18, 2006
    Photographs from a sound check in Düsseldorf, 5th March, 2005.
    March 12, 2006
    Photographs from a sound check in Lucerne, Switzerland on March 5, 2006.
    March 9, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 6, No. 2.
    March 4, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 7, No. 3: this one is a special-feature issue about Ottilie Patterson.
    February 19, 2006
    Photos of the Big Chris Barber Band in Denmark, 2004.
    February 19, 2006
    Here's another selection from the Best Of Both Worlds LP, There'll Be Some Changes Made, featuring Edmond Hall on clarinet.
    February 12, 2006
    A collage of photographs of the Chris Barber Band at the Zurich Jazz Festival, October (?) 1964.
    February 11, 2006
    In the absence of new additions to the site this week, why not listen to Wrap Your Troubles In Dreams? This lovely Pat Halcox solo was recorded on 5th November 1963 and was originally released on the LP, The Best Of Both Worlds. It's never been re-issued on CD.
    February 4, 2006
    More details about the new Vintage Chris Barber (Jazz Sacred & Secular) CD, with some music excerpts, cover scans, and notes by Andreas Wandfluh.
    January 28, 2006
    Announcement of the CD reissue on Lake Records of the classic 1954-55 LP, Jazz Sacred and Secular.
    January 28, 2006
    Chris Barber Club booklet Vol. 6, No. 1.
    January 22, 2006
    Photographs of the Big Chris Barber Band in Hapag-Hallen Cuxhaven, Germany, January 7, 2006.
    January 21, 2006
    Preview announcement of Tight Like That, a new CD by Jeff Healey's Jazz Wizards with Chris Barber.
    January 16, 2006
    The pages for members of the Big Chris Barber Band are now complete with the addition of John Defferary's page.
    January 14, 2006
    At long last, here is a page to celebrate the third-longest-serving member of the band, blues guitarist John Slaughter.
    January 8, 2006
    Tour Programme, probably from 1978. This is a rare programme from a tour featuring the relatively short-lived line-up of the band after Sammy Rimington joined but before John Slaughter left. The programme includes a contribution in both English and German by Humphrey Lyttelton.
    December 18, 2005
    Thanks to Gerard Bielderman, here is the second (and last) magazine from the Dutch Chris Barber Club (1958).
    December 17, 2005
    Band archivist Julian Purser recently came acoss an excellent publicity photo of Chris and the Band taken some time between 1971 and 1973. It's one of the rare pictures to feature banjo player Steve Hammond.
    December 16, 2005
    Two photographs of Andy Fairweather-Low on tour with the Big Chris Barber Band, December 2005.
    December 11, 2005
    An article from the British magazine, Today, published in August 1961 at the height of the "trad boom".
    December 3, 2005
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Volume 5, Number 6 .
    November 28, 2005
    The programme from one of the most famous Chris Barber concerts – a performance at the Royal Festival Hall on 15 December, 1956.
    November 20, 2005
    In this announcement from the opening of the second part of a concert in Denmark in January, 2005, Chris reflects on playing the music from 1954 and introduces the 2005 version of the six-piece Chris Barber's Jazz Band.
    November 11, 2005
    Photographs by Helge Lorenz, taken at the 100 Club in London, December 2004.
    November 11, 2005
    Programme from a British concert tour in the late 1950s.
    November 5, 2005
    German fan and webmaster Toni Ginsel has posted new pages of photos of recent concerts in Dortmund and Stuttgart.
    October 22, 2005
    The website's collection of Chris Barber Club magazines continues with Volume 5, Number 5. This one is notable for some Omega Brass Band photos, featuring Monty Sunshine with Ian Wheeler, and Ken Colyer with Pat Halcox.
    October 16, 2005
    Message board started.
    October 16, 2005
    Review of Chris Barber's most recent CD reissue, Best Yet!
    October 11, 2005
    Booklet from the Dutch Chris Barber Club, 1958.
    October 5, 2005
    Chris's most recent CD, a reissue of the 1962 LP Best Yet! with additional singles and rarities, is shown in the left column. Details to follow soon.
    October 2, 2005
    Rare photos of the band in the late 1960s or early 1970s
    September 24, 2005
    Tour programme from the early 1960s.
    September 18, 2005
    Revisions to the navigation buttons on the menu page.
    September 17, 2005
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Volume 3, Number 4.
    September 11, 2005
    A series of pages about the four Chris Barber Plays 10-inch LPs from the 1950s.
    September 10, 2005
    The Big Chris Barber Band page has been completely re-designed.
    September 10, 2005
    Eight EP covers have been added to the EP covers page.
    August 27, 2005
    Click here for news about a forthcoming CD of Chris's concerts in Toronto with Jeff Healey's Jazz Wizards.
    August 27, 2005
    The Liverpool Concert photos page is now complete, with more than 50 photographs.
    August 21, 2005
    Eight rehearsal photos have been added to the Liverpool Concert photos page, with still more to come soon.
    August 18, 2005
    An additional nine photographs (backstage) are now on the Liverpool Concert photos page.
    August 15, 2005
    Eighteen photographs from the 75th Birthday Concert in Liverpool.
    August 10, 2005
    Sister Rosetta Tharpe 1957 Tour Programme.
    August 7, 2005
    "Blues History" -- a 2005 article reproduced from fROOTS magazine: "Chris Barber formed his first band in 1949, set the scene for skiffle, and in the late '50s was responsible for introducing legendary blues players like Muddy Waters to the UK. Here he reminisces to Dave Peabody about that era, setting right a few myths along the way...."
    Weekend beginning July 29
    Several updates this weekend: (1) New Feature Item: 75th Birthday Concert; (2) Announcement of Chris's visit to Toronto (top of the menu page); (3) Several EP covers added to the EPs page; and (4) Scan of a concert announcement from 1972.
    July 27, 2005
    Julian Purser's article about the Chris Barber 75th Birthday Concert in Liverpool, 6 July 2005. Photographs are not yet available but will be posted here soon.
    July 25, 2005
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Volume 6, Number 4.
    July 23, 2005
    Several more record covers have been posted on the EPs page. Thanks to Poul Villum for many new scans.
    July 18, 2005
    "The Barber of Tradville" -- Photos and an article from a British teen magazine, 1962, at the height of the British "trad boom."
    July 16, 2005
    Programme from the 1958 tour with Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee.
    July 9, 2005
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Volume 2, Number 4.
    July 3, 2005
    The EPs section of the website has been significantly updated with more pages and scans, including thumbnail pictures of all covers donated so far by fans. We'd be grateful for scans of any EPs that you own but are not displayed on this page.
    June 25, 2005
    Chis Barber Club booklet, Vol. 7, No. 2: This one is notable for its features and photos about the recording of Chris Barber's American Jazz Band.
    June 18, 2005
    Two additions this week: first, four more EP covers; and second, a 1958 concert programme.
    June 11, 2005
    A newly-scanned set of photographs of Chris Barber and the band has been posted on Photos, page 7.
    June 3, 2005
    We have finally posted a photo of Mike Whalley, newest member of the band's road crew; plus four more EP covers have been added to the EPs page, thanks to Kjell Wiklund.

    May 29, 2005
    Thanks to Kjell Wiklund, several record covers have been added to the EPs page, with more to come soon.

    May 27, 2005
    Programme from the Richmond Jazz Festival, 1962, featuring Chris Barber, Humphrey Lyttelton, Johnny Dankworth, Kenny Ball, and many other notable musicians and bands of that time.
    May 11, 2005
    There is a new interview with former Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band bass player Jackie Flavelle on his page in the Former Members section of the website.
    May 8, 2005
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 5, No. 4 .
    May 3, 2005
    Thanks to Ivan Spring of Ontario, Canada, who has loaned nine covers for posting on the Barber website, the number of EP covers is now up to 44.
    April 29, 2005
    A new guest book has been added to the site (see the bottom of the Menu page).
    April 24, 2005
    Complete list of recordings by Ken Colyer's Jazzmen, 1953-1954, featuring Chris Barber, Monty Sunshine, Lonnie Donegan, Jim Bray, and Ron Bowden.
    April 22, 2005
    Chris Barber's Blues Book, Volume One has been added to the Individual Covers pages.
    April 17, 2005
    HAPPY 75th BIRTHDAY CHRIS, WITH BEST WISHES FROM YOUR FANS ALL AROUND THE WORLD.
    April 17, 2005
    Thanks to Gerard Bielderman, two record covers have been added to the EPs page.
    April 16, 2005
    More records, recent and not-so recent, have been added to the Individual Covers pages.
    April 15, 2005
    Two recent newspaper articles, the first in English and the second in German.
    April 9, 2005
    Please take this opportunity to vote for Lake Records in the BBC Jazz Awards 2005 poll.
    April 8, 2005
    A new feature page: 45 rpm EP records from the 1950s and 1960s.
    April 3, 2005
    Programme from the Take Me Back To New Orleans Tour in the mid-1980s: lots of colour photos, band members' biographies, and articles in English and German.
    April 2, 2005
    The Water Rats Ball page now features a short article by Chas McDevitt , which includes an appreciation of Chris's early and lasting contributions to music in the UK.
    March 25, 2005
    Colin Miller's replacement on drums is John Sutton, formerly of the Pasadena Roof Orchestra.
    March 25, 2005
    One of the longest-serving drummers in the band, Colin Miller, has recently retired. All the best to Colin for the future.
    March 24, 2005
    Thanks to Chas McDevitt, you can see two rare photos of the Lonnie Donegan Skiffle Group from 1954.
    March 19, 2005
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 7, Number 6.
    March 14, 2005
    Photographs from the Water Rats Ball, 2004, where Chris received the "Living Legend" award.
    March 13, 2005
    Programme from a 1971-1972 tour: This booklet is interesting because it is longer than most, contains photos and short essays about each band member, and has the text in three languages -- English, Frech, and German.
    March 6, 2005
    Guestbooks added.
    March 3, 2005
    First announcement (here, at any rate) of a new double-CD from Lake Records, The Classic Concerts (see the details on the New Releases page).
    February 27, 2005
    Diana Gardner was the band's secretary in the mid-1950s, and was therefore responsible for producing the Chris Barber Club booklets in the early years. Now, almost fifty years later, she shares her reminiscences of those days.
    February 26, 2005
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 4, No. 3
    February 25, 2005
    The remainder of the photos taken by Andreas Wandfluh and Julian Purser in Denmark are now available in full-screen size.
    February 19, 2005
    Half of the photos taken by Andreas Wandfluh and Julian Purser in Denmark are now available in full-screen size.
    February 19, 2005
    Thanks to fan Chris Robbins, here is Chris Barber's foreword to a book about skiffle in the 1950s.
    February 17, 2005
    Lake Records has recently re-released the classic 1953 New Orleans To London recordings by Ken Colyer's Jazzmen. Go to the New Releases page for details.
    February 4, 2005
    There is now a Photographs, page 6, which shows pictures taken during the band's short tour of Denmark in January.
    January 30, 2005
    Ray Green of Auckland, New Zealand, remembers the 2000 Down Under Tour by the Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band and Kenny Ball's Jazzmen.
    January 28, 2005
    A new CD of rare tracks recorded by Ken Colyer's Jazzmen in Denmark in 1953 has recently been released. See the New and Recent Releases page for more details.
    January 22, 2005
    The Great Reunion Concert is the most recent addition to the Covers Pages.
    January 22, 2005
    Programme from a concert in Toronto, Canada, on October 12, 1960.
    January 16, 2005
    The Big Chris Barber Band in Denmark, January 2005: Andreas Wandfluh's account of his eventful trip to Denmark to see the band perform with Sjællands Symfoniorkester.
    January 8, 2005
    Programme from a tour of East Germany, 1965.
    December 22, 2004
    The latest Chris Barber Club booklet to be added is Volume 2, Number 1.
    December 18, 2004
    The website collection of booklets from the Chris Barber Club continues to grow with the addition of Volume 5, Number 7.
    December 15, 2004
    The Big Chris Barber Band in concert, Orwell Park School, 3rd December 2004, reviewed by Jerry Brown.
    December 12, 2004
    A page for Big Chris Barber Band bassist Vic Pitt, with a selection of photos and a brief biography.
    December 11, 2004
    The Big Chris Barber Band shared the bill with Humphrey Lyttelton and His Band at Colston Hall in Bristol on December 10, 2004.
    December 10, 2004
    A page for Big Chris Barber Band trombonist & arranger Bob Hunt, with a selection of photos and a brief biography.
    December 8, 2004
    Announcement of a CD featuring past and present members of the Barber band.
    December 5, 2004
    Thanks to archive team member Andreas Wandfluh's work, we can now view the complete booklet that was included along with the six-LP Chris Barber Jubilee Album set of records released in 1974. The booklet includes some rare photographs, brief biographies of the then-personnel, and a lengthy piece by Chris himself. All of the text is in both English and German.
    November 19, 2004
    Jeff Van Horn of Austin, Texas, recently visited Germany, where he not only heard but also met the Big Chris Barber Band. Here is his story of the great evening he spent with the band.
    November 12, 2004
    A page for Big Chris Barber Band reedman Tony Carter, with a selection of photos and a brief biography.
    November 5, 2004
    Two items from Jazz News, July 1961.
    October 31, 2004
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Volume 2, Number 6.
    October 29, 2004
    Swiss newspaper article (14 October, 2004) about the recent Chris Barber in Switzerland 1974/75 double-CD from Lake Records.
    October 23, 2004
    In keeping with the archives team's goal of posting all of the Chris Barber Club booklets from the 1950s, you can now read Volume 3, Number 5.
    October 16, 2004
    Programme from the Floating Festival of Jazz, June 1958.
    October 9, 2004
    Photographs, by Hans Barth, of the Chris Barber Jazz & Blues Band in the Netherlands in 1975. Hans's accompanying text (on Photographs, page 5) is in Dutch and English.
    October 3, 2004
    Meet the men "Behind the scenes" at a Chris Barber concert -- Richard Oliver and Barry Walker.
    October 3, 2004
    Read about Colin Miller, drummer with the Big Chris Barber Band.
    October 1, 2004
    A double-CD and a single CD have been released in the last couple of weeks. You can get all the details either on the New Releases page or the Covers pages.
    September 28, 2004
    Two music books from the 1950s, linked from the "From the archives..." page.
    September 25, 2004
    An article in Dutch, reminiscing about a 1959 Barber recording.
    September 19, 2004
    Programme from a tour of Germany with American clarinettist Edmond Hall in 1962. The text is in German.
    September 11, 2004
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Volume 5, Number 9, is notable for some rare photographs and a detailed account of the second American tour.
    September 5, 2004
    A page for former band member Jackie Flavelle, and another for Johnny Duncan.
    September 4, 2004
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Volume 2, Number 2: this one is particularly interesting for an article by Ottilie about Chris, plus an account of Eddie Condon's visit to England.
    September 1, 2004
    Posters and a programme from Sweden, 1960s.
    August 28, 2004
    Volume One of the Chris Barber Club booklets is now complete on the website, with the addition of Numbers 4 and 5.
    August 22, 2004
    Programme from the 30 Years Tour in 1985, featuring Ken Colyer and Monty Sunshine. The text is in both English and German.
    August 21, 2004
    Entry to the Recordings section of the website has been re-designed to look better and to make it easier to get to the sub-pages.
    August 15, 2004
    Sound-check and offstage photos of the Big Chris Barber Band, by Julian Purser.
    August 14, 2004
    Chapter from a 1960s book, Trad Mad.
    August 8, 2004
    All of the Big Chris Barber Band pages have been updated to reflect the new personnel: Andy Kuc on banjo and guitar, and Richard Exall on reeds.
    August 6, 2004
    Details of a new 6-CD box set, The Nixa Jazz Today Albums.

    August 2, 2004
    New items added over the last couple of weeks include:
    The Chris Barber Story, Part 2.
    A Sunday newspaper magazine article from 1974: three photographs plus six pages of text (linked to the From the archives page).
    The 1954-1994 Reunion Tour: Souvenir booklet and concert programme. This is a nicely illustrated 32-page booklet with numerous photographs in colour and black-&-white, and with text in both English and German.
    Chris Barber Club, booklet Volume 7, Number 5.
    A poster of 117 Chris Barber Band record covers.
    Programme from a 1966 tour of Switzerland.

    July 17, 2004
    Here are 24 photographs from a Washington, DC, parade by members of the Barber Band with the Eureka Brass Band in the early 1960s.
    July 10, 2004
    Two programmes added to the Tours and Concerts page.
    July 5, 2004
    A page to mark the 50th anniversary of the recording of New Orleans Joys, 13 July 1954.
    July 4, 2004
    Paul Sealey and Trevor Whiting are leaving the Big Chris Barber Band, to be replaced by Richard Exall and Andy Kuc.
    July 3, 2004
    Andreas Wandfluh has contributed fifteen excellent new photographs.
    July 3, 2004
    Julian Purser reports on the Lonnie Donegan Tribute Concert at the Royal Albert Hall, London, on Monday 21 June, 2004.
    July 2, 2004
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 1, No. 3.
    June 26, 2004
    Programme from a 1960 Dutch concert tour.
    June 26, 2004
    A Barber fan is looking for rare CDs to complete his collection. Please see the Fan Correspondence page.
    June 25, 2004
    Go to Photographs page 4 for about two dozen newly-scanned pictures from the Barber-Purser archives.
    June 22, 2004
    Two CD covers have been added to the Covers page: That's It Then and Cornbread, Peas And Black Molasses.
    June 20, 2004
    A page for Monty Sunshine, including a short biography, photographs, music, and CD covers.
    June 20, 2004
    Chris Barber Club booklet, Vol. 1, No. 2.
    [Updates from mid-March to mid-June, 2004 have been lost]
    March 16, 2004
    Added a page for former band member Stu Morrison.
    March 14, 2004
    Added a page for former band member Eddie Smith, and some more documents from a concert in New Orleans on October 26, 1959.
    March 11, 2004
    There is now a new sub-section on the Barber website: Former Members of the Band. It's part of the Jazz Band/Jazz & Blues Band section, but you can get to it directly by going to the sub-section home page. So far, the "Archives Team" has compiled just two biographies (Dick Smith and Steve Hammond), but we hope to be able to complete the list as time goes on. Also, there are now more than 160 pictures of record covers on the Thumbnails page.
    March 6, 2004
    A new CD of very early Barber recordings has recently been released by Lake Records. Vintage Ken Colyer includes 22 tracks recorded by Ken Colyer's Jazzmen in Copenhagen in April and May 1953. Details are on the New releases page and elsewhere in the website.
    March 4, 2004
    Several new programmes have been added to the Tours and Concerts page. Also, there is a series of inter-linked pages about the Louis Jordan tour and recordings in 1962. The best place to start is on the Record covers page and follow the links for The Best Of Both Worlds and Louis Jordan & Chris Barber.
    February 27, 2004
    Julian Purser has contributed an illustrated review of two recent concerts by the Big Chris Barber Band: at Swindon on February 23 and Yeovil on February 24.
    February 26, 2004
    There is now an individual cover page for the First Eleven CD. You can get to it directly, or via the Covers page. A notable feature of the new page is the opportunity to compare (in sound clips) the Big Chris Barber Band version of Sweetness with the recording by Vancouver band Sweet Papa Lowdown on which the Barber version was based.
    February 22, 2004
    There are some new programmes on the Tours and Concerts page.
    February 20, 2004
    A few messages have been posted on the Fan Correspondence page.
    FEATURE PAGES
    The Chris Barber Band, 1954 to 2009: Fifty-five Years of Musical Milestones -- a page to celebrate the 55th anniversary of the founding of Chris Barber's Jazz Band in May 1954.
    A page of covers and sleeve notes from EP records from the 1950s and 1960s
    50th anniversary of Ottilie Patterson joining the band on January 1st, 1955
    Welcome to new band members Andy Kuc and Richard Exall
    A series of newspaper articles (in German, but with some introductory text in English) about the Big Chris Barber Band
    50th anniversary of the recording of New Orleans Joys, 13 July 1954 / Vor fünfzig Jahren: Chris Barber's Jazz Band und ihre LP New Orleans Joys
    50th anniversary of the formation of Chris Barber’s Jazz Band and the Chris Barber-Pat Halcox partnership / 50 Jahre Chris Barber's Jazz Band
    50th anniversary of the recording of New Orleans to London, by Ken Colyer’s Jazzmen / Vor fünfzig Jahren: Ken Colyer's Jazzmen und ihre LP New Orleans to London
    Results of the first Big Chris Barber Band competition / Resultate des ersten Wettbewerbes über die Big Chris Barber Band
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