Burton Agnes Jazz and Blues Festival 2013

The 7th Burton Agnes Jazz and Blues Festival, held in the grounds and halls of the award winning Burton Agnes Hall (Yorkshire in Bloom Gold Award winners 2011 & 2012), announce their Saturday evening headline acts - the legendary Kenny Ball and Irish blues guitar hero Simon McBride – along with this years festival tickets information (see below). 

Burton Agnes Jazz & Blues Festival July 5th, 6th and 7th 2013

www.burtonagnes.com

“Possibly the most enjoyable jazz concert I’ve ever attended.” The Independent

“Tis the musical equivalent of a Sunday stroll through the grounds of a stately home… you won’t find more beautifully serene surroundings this side of Woodstock for such an experience”  All Gigs – Festival review

Held over three days, and showcasing some of the UK’s hottest jazz and blues acts in the most stunning, magnificent and serene of surroundings, the festival returns for a 7th consecutive year.

With performances both inside the stately Elizabethan Hall and outside in the Halls beautiful grounds, the Burton Agnes Jazz & Blues festival presents a varied line up of funk, traditional jazz, hard blues, dreamy vocals and everything in between.

The main stage on the lawn hosts the festival’s main stage. With rolling fields behind and pristine woodland to the side, you couldn’t ask for a more stunning and relaxing setting for some of the UK’s top Jazz and Blues artists to perform. Inside the Hall, intimate acoustic performances mix with original Elizabethan carvings and French Impressionist art to create an inimitable festival experience.

Local food and drink feature heavily at the festival. At the tea tent and food lawn, festival goers can indulge in home-baked treats, barbecued local meats, freshly prepared curries, and salads grown in the neighboring walled garden. In the beer tent award winning Wold Top beer is on tap, brewed just five miles away from the festival site.

A campsite in the field adjacent to the Hall offers welcome hot showers and panoramic views of the Yorkshire Wolds for those wishing to pitch a tent for a night or the whole weekend.

Burton Agnes Jazz & Blues Festival welcomes families of all ages with its safe, easy-going vibe. There is plenty on offer for children including a Children’s Corner with play area, 15 acres of magical gardens to explore including a walled garden with maze, jungle garden and giant games and a woodland walk with forest creatures to find. Free face painting and balloon artistry keeps the children amused whilst the grown-ups enjoy some of the finest Jazz and Blues music and beautiful surroundings.

Kenny Ball & His Jazzmen

www.kennyball.co.uk/

Among the leading traditional jazz trumpet players on the eastern side of the Atlantic arguably the most successful is Kenny Ball. Kenny achieved worldwide fame for his recordings in the 1960’s. Including “Midnight in Moscow” which reached No. 2 in the UK and the US charts and hit worldwide sales of more than one million copies, the debut hit “Samantha” and the smash “When I’m 64”, made Kenny a household name. With no fewer than 20 albums on sale, a Billboard Gold Microphone Award, more top 30’s in the US than Louis Armstrong, and honorary citizenship to the city of New Orleans, Kenny Ball is no less than a - true legend.
Kenny was born in 1930 in Ilford, Essex. He began his career as a sideman in bands before forming his own in 1958. Moving away from the overworked traditional repertoire, the band sought out tuneful songs from all sources, gave them the ‘Kenny Ball’ treatment, gained hit after hit, and took the band to worldwide renown during the heyday of the traditional jazz boom of the 1960’s.

Probably the greatest test of an artist’s success is his durability. Along with his Jazzmen, Kenny is now in his 50th year and, as a band, they continue to put on a musical, swinging show, performed with energy and enthusiasm. A tour of Australia and New Zealand in 2000, and a string of continuous gigs throughout Britain and Germany were typical among the average 150 dates per year the band fulfilled, up until 2002. At the start of the year recording began on the new album; in April Kenny was taken ill and battled with his illness to recover, complete the album, and return to performing in July.

Today, the love of music inspires Kenny to continue to record. With part of that original band, John Bennett (Trombone), and other members of his current band, “Jazzical Class” is on the verge of release. Kenny is a very content man, who still continues to produce some timeless, yet refreshing pieces of great jazz!

Simon McBride

www.simonmcbride.net

Predicted to be the next Irish blues guitar hero following in the footsteps of Rory Gallagher and Gary Moore, former Young Guitarist of the Year Simon McBride has undeniable guitar artistry combined with a fine voice and a real knack for creating memorable hooks and great melodies.

His latest CD Crossing The Line is a fiery amalgam of guitar skills, songcraft and character-soaked vocals, spinning tales of girls, gambling and corporate avarice. Recorded in Northern Ireland and The USA, mixing of the album was placed in the experienced hands of New York-based Peter Denenberg, the veteran producer and engineer whose CV takes in everyone from Deep Purple to the Spin Doctors and Robert Cray. Industry critics reckon this is the album that truly delivers on McBride’s potential.

And what potential. Rewind to the early-’90s, and you didn’t have to squint to spot future greatness in the unassuming kid from Belfast, who picked up his first guitar at ten and eschewed formal lessons to bend his fingers around the music of Free, Jeff Beck and Hendrix. Aged 15, Simon won Guitarist’s hotly-contested Young Guitarist of the Year competition in a Wembley Conference Centre showdown, and at 16, he turned pro, leaving education behind to wow the world as a hired gun in projects than ranged from metal with Sweet Savage, to R&B and soul with ex-Commitments vocalist Andrew Strong.

Even by the lofty standards of Northern Ireland , where drinkers still raise a toast to the audacious talent of the late Rory Gallagher and Gary Moore, this young maestro’s name was soon starting to be dropped in the same reverential breath. Certainly, Simon is a fan, and the energy and aggression of his live show recalls those much-missed Irish masters, but when he released his debut album Rich Man Falling in 2008, it was clear this musician was nobody’s heir, but rather his own artist.

A UK tour opening for guitar wizard Joe Satriani gave Simon’s profile a boost, while he proved his appeal reached far beyond guitar nuts with a set at Glastonbury 2011, and Don Airey’s Soul & Blues Festival. He has also supported Jeff Beck and Joe Bonamassa.

“McBride is now among the best blues-rock players anywhere in the world.” GUITARIST MAGAZINE

“Hugely accomplished.” MOJO

 Tickets for the 2013 Burton Agnes Jazz & Blues Festival are on sale now and the prices are discounted until May 31st.

You can order online from the festival website: www.burtonagnes.com/Jazz_Festival/Tickets_and_Prices.html ,
 by phoning Burton Agnes Hall estate office weekdays 9am to midday on 01262 490 324 and also by visiting Burton Agnes Hall courtyard shop at Burton Agnes, Driffield, East Yorkshire, YO25 4NB.