The Attraction of the Jazz Joints
By and large, jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn't want your daughter to associate with.
—Duke Ellington
Jazz is the language of the emotions.
—Charles Mingus
I spent a good deal of my mildly reprehensible youth listening to jazz in places where I was not supposed to be—predominantly in Soho in Central London. From about the age of 14, in the early 1960s, I began a lifelong love affair with jazz—not just the sounds but with the places in which it was played and the people who played it.
Soho has become gentrified in these days and few of the old, smoky subterranean jazz joints remain; none of them are smoky now of course and most have become boutiques or perfume shops—ironically sweet fragrances have replaced the heady mixture of sweat and tobacco. The most famous is Ronnie Scott’s jazz club but it has been deformed into a corporate “venue” for tourists and visiting business types (but at least it’s there, even if hideously expensively and much altered in ethos). These were refuges from respectability.
Continue Reading
On the way to Yu Garden.
Claire Shrader is an official CAPA blogger for spring 2018, sharing 
Bianca the friendly cat is a must-visit attraction!
Photo: 
