Jeff Clyne: Bassist and stalwart of the British jazz scene for 40 years
Hyfler/Rosner
for 40 years
Friday, 20 November 2009
For four decades, Jeff Clyne led the way as the most
accomplished and versatile of British bass players.
Some would claim that, despite its grandiose title, the apex
of British big band jazz was Tubby Hayes' 1966 recording
100% Proof. Clyne had been renowned among musicians and jazz
club audiences since he joined the Jazz Couriers in 1958,
but it was his work throughout the Hayes album and his
imaginative bass soloing on the Miles Davis tune
"Milestones" that introduced a large swathe of the world's
jazz fans to the accomplishments of his work.
In his listings in a booker's guide to available musicians,
Clyne described himself as playing "Contemporary, Bebop,
Fusion, Free/Improvised and Mainstream", thus covering just
about all the posts outside of banjo-driven jazz. But it was
no idle claim, for he was able to express himself with
eloquence in any style and was much sought after by any
bandleader who found him available, being soon corralled as
a regular by Tubby Hayes and Ronnie Scott after his arrival
on the scene in the late Fifties. It was appropriate that he
appeared at Ronnie Scott's on its opening night in November
1959, when the advertised attractions included Hayes, Scott
and "the first appearance in a jazz club since the relief of
Mafeking by Jack Parnell".
After a brief flirtation with the tenor saxophone, Clyne
took up bass-playing when he was 17 and reached such a high
standard so quickly that he was able to join The Third
Hussars Band the next year for his National Service.
Released from the army in 1957 he worked with Tony Crombie's
Rockets and formed an early association with the pianist
Stan Tracey before working for three months on the Atlantic
liner Mauretania.
In late 1958 he joined the Jazz Couriers, a hard bop quintet
co-led by Scott and Hayes that was intended as a British
parallel to Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, and stayed until
May the next year. After a tour of US Army bases in France
with the tenor saxophonist Bobby Wellins, he returned to
England and joined the clarinettist Vic Ash's Quartet in
September of that year. From there, he joined the Tubby
Hayes Quartet, where he stayed until 1961.
He played often with Hayes in the succeeding years, and was
already probing into free improvisation, one of the more
daunting and less popular forms of the music. Clyne was,
until the end of his life, to keep abreast of new
developments in jazz and was often seen at concerts and
recitals checking on the work of new musicians emerging on
to the jazz scene.
In 1965 he was with Bobby Wellins in the Stan Tracey Quartet
which recorded Tracey's remarkable Under Milk Wood suite.
The album remains a classic among jazz performances and it
was no surprise when in 1966, after spells with various
small groups, Clyne became a house musician at Ronnie
Scott's, where Stan Tracey was the resident pianist.
From then on, Clyne backed and was respected by leading
American musicians such as Zoot Sims and Ben Webster and
accompanied a legion of singers such as Annie Ross, Marian
Montgomery and Norma Winstone.
Clyne travelled to the US to study music from October 1966
to February 1967 and by now was playing with avant-garde
musicians in the Spontaneous Music Ensemble and Trevor
Watts' Amalgam. He was also a member of many piano trios in
the late Sixties, notably those of Dudley Moore and Gordon
Beck. His role in the Don Rendell-Ian Carr Quintet in 1968
led to him joining Ian Carr's Nucleus, a mightily successful
fusion band that won an award at the Newport Jazz Festival
in 1970 and with which Clyne played until 1971.
Always in demand, he played over the next few years with
Alan Skidmore's Quartet, Bob Downes' Open Music, the London
Jazz Composers' Orchestra, and his own band, Turning Point,
co-led with the singer Pepi Lemer, for which he composed
much of the music. Turning Point recorded two distinguished
albums, Creatures of the Night (1977) and Silent Promise
(1978). Another outstanding album under his name was Twice
Upon a Time, recorded in 1987 with the guitarist Phil Lee.
As important as his appearances in all these bands was his
work in music education. He was a co-director of the
Wavendon summer jazz course and taught at the Guildhall
School of Music and at the Royal Academy of Music.
He played jazz gigs until the end of his life and despite
his fame and achievements, Clyne remained a modest man. On
his death, the internet was flooded with messages from his
grateful students, who he also regarded as friends.
Steve Voce
Jeffrey Ovid Clyne, bass player and music teacher: born
London 29 January 1937; married (two sons, one daughter);
died London 16 November 2009.