American trumpeters guesting at the 100 Club these days have a problem – to follow Colin Smith who, with clarinettist Dave Jones, leads the nonpareil ‘house band’. For Smith, a world-class trumpeter is playing now as well or better than ever before: ripe-toned, full-range trumpet combining speedy waspish attacks in the middle register, full-throated confident flights into the top, and the ability to shake originality from standard sequences like diamonds from carbon.
Butterfield – now middle-aged, portly and looking uncannily like William Conrad of T.V. ‘Cannon’ fame – took the stage after Smith had led the band with professional aplomb into You Took Advantage Of Me. His first chorus, full-toned and lyrical, contained two early top Fs pitched strong and accurate; perhaps the source of a touch of lip-strain that occasionally interfered with his performance. But through band numbers and a long quartet set Butterfield paraded the virtues that had led nearly every jazz trumpeter in London to the session: fleet, perky ideas, featherweight top notes (stroked, not hit) lightning flares into the extreme upper register, and enormous lyric sensitivity.
A great jazz trumpeter – and a great band; Pete Strange iron-lipped and fierily creative, a trombone giant by any standards; clarinettist Dave Jones muscular and lyrical by turns, a jazz heavyweight; Keith Ingham who must soon be recognised as the great jazz pianist he is, and Johnnie Richardson the inimitable. A lovely night of good and great jazz.
