The Ian Bateman Quintet - A Tribute to Frank Rosolino & JJ Johnson

Ian’s exciting new band has an all-star line-up of British jazz talent. The band recreates the fabulous quintets of trombonists Frank Rosolino and JJ Johnson from the late 1950’s – early 1960’s, both of which comprised trombone and tenor sax with a trio.

The music is essentially hard swinging jazz and mainly original compositions by these two great trombonists. All the music is from transcriptions that Ian scored from original recordings and is sure to have your feet tapping to some of the greatest swinging jazz music played with love and enthusiasm by the greatest swinging musicians in the country:

Playing alongside Ian, we have the following star-studded line-up:

Alex Garnett – Tenor Saxophone. Son of acclaimed British sax player Willie Garnett, Alex also started learning the sax at an early age. As one of the most exciting young tenor players in Europe, Alex Garnett is one of the most in-demand of UK session players, perhaps best known on the jazz scene for his superb work with Ray Gelato’s Giants, but can equally well be found in settings that cover the best of blues, jazz and popular music, playing with Chaka Khan, Paul Weller, Buddy Guy, Van Morrison, Guy Barker, Gerard Presencer, Dave Cliff, Ruby Turner, Johnny ‘Guitar’ Watson and Albert King amongst others.

Leon Greening – Piano. Pianist Leon Greening studied at Leeds College of Music and the Guildhall. His extraordinary solos, inspired by the likes of Wynton Kelly and Bud Powell, keep the audience on the edge of their seats and mark him out, at the age of only 35, as one of the finest pianists this country has ever produced.
Leon was voted runner-up in the 1999 Sun Alliance Musician of the Year awards. He has performed at Ronnie Scott's and with Christian Brewer Quartet, Matt Wates Sextet, Gareth Lockrane Septet and toured with pop band 'Incognito'.

Dave Green – Bass. A giant of the British Jazz Scene, they don’t come much bigger than bassist Dave Green and he relishes every opportunity he gets to play this music so we’re all in for a treat! Over 50 years in the business, Dave is well remembered for his association with the bands of Humphrey Lyttelton, Stan Tracey, Don Rendell, Michael Garrick and more recently Chris Barber and Scott Hamilton. He is also a regular at Ronnie Scott’s and has performed over the years with Coleman Hawkins, Ben Webster, Roland Kirk and Sonny Rollins amongst others.

Richie Bryant – Drums. Richie has been the regular drummer with Acker Bilk’s Paramount Jazz Band since the early 1970’s and is still in the seat to this day. He has been playing constantly at the top for over 40 years and even before this was a familiar face on the British jazz scene as it progressed through the ‘Trad Boom’.
This band returns Richie to the kind of swinging jazz he enjoyed playing before those heady days. Richie does a lot of small group work and presents his own all-star line-ups at the Corus Hotel jazz nights every month in London.