Brilliant Corners: The Albert Inn, Bedminster

Mention the name Albert to any veteran (grizzled or otherwise) of the Bristol jazz scene, and they smile and say ‘Ian’. Mention Ian Storrer and they’ll say ‘The Albert’. For 20 years that pairing represented the heart of Bristol’s jazz renaissance.

Saxophonist Andy Sheppard, an early beneficiary, remembers it with a smile: “It was like an oasis because of Ian, really, his enthusiasm for the music and the way he communicated with musicians. He made you feel so welcome, and that’s why it became such a great gig.”

Adrian Utley, a regular session guitarist who later founded trip-hop band Portishead, has equally fond memories: “The Albert was great and Ian ran that place against all the odds. [Bristol suburb] Bedminster was dismal at night back then – deserted - but then you’d go inside to this really buzzing place. How good was that?”

For 20 years, thanks to landlord Storrer’s tireless efforts, the cramped bar of a shabbily unprepossessing pub offered a phenomenal weekly programme of top national and international jazz stars. Regrettably, brewery politics would force him from the pub in 2003 but he has continued promoting music as Jazz At The Albert, reflecting the enormous affection held by musicians and jazz fans for the pub’s glory days.

With 2024 being his fortieth year as promoter, Ian Storrer can now claim credit for an astonishing 3,500 gigs to date.

Young jazz-lover Storrer began managing The Albert for a friend in 1979 and found the publican’s lifestyle short on opportunities to catch live music.

“Running the pub was seven days a week, for years I never had a holiday,” he recalls. “Because I couldn’t get out, the only way I could experience live music was to put it on myself.”

Thanks to pub regular Martin Genge, himself a forceful tenor sax player, he started fortnightly free music with local bands, enhanced by the occasional touring band en route to gigs in Cornwall or South Wales. Then Storrer began inviting London players down to play with local rhythm sections, often including Utley as sideman. Dick Morrisey was the first visitor in 1986 and, despite the rudimentary set-up, he loved the atmosphere. Soon others followed and monthly ticketed ‘guest’ sessions proved successful. Things grew apace once a piano was invested in and Jazz At The Albert became a star-studded feature of the South West scene.

The catalogue of names that played the pub in the ensuing years is astounding: UK stars included Julian Joseph, Dick Heckstall-Smith, Mike and Kate Westbrook, Evan Parker, Stan Sulzmann, Keith Tippett, Norma Winstone, Bobby Wellins and Django Bates; US visitors included Tal Farlow, Don Byron, Kirk Lightsey, Joey Calderazzo and the Dirty Dozen Brass Band while among the Europeans Ingrid Laubrock, Viktoria Tolstoy, Fapy Lafertin and the European Jazz Ensemble all figured.

Ian had an early ambition to get all the sax players from Loose Tubes, “which I eventually managed - Tim Whitehead, Iain Bellamy, Mark Lockheart, Julian Arguelles … I just wanted to get the best of the best.”

Jean Toussaint brought drummer Clarke Tracey who suggested Ian book his dad.

“So Stan Tracey came down and did a gig. He hated my old upright piano but still kept coming with a couple of quartets, a couple of quintets, a septet. Then, at one point, we got a baby grand in for a TV programme. ‘This piano I like!’ he said.”

One memorable night featured guitarist Wayne Krantz’s Trio giving no quarter on amp volume, another saw US star David Murray joined by the young Andy Sheppard for some inspired dueling. Ian’s support for Sheppard was a crucial factor in Andy’s success, as the ECM saxophonist remembers: “I’d just come from living in Paris and went looking for gigs. I ended up doing every other Sunday at The Albert. I would have played there every week,
it was such a great gig.”

Ian’s forceful encouragement made a reluctant Sheppard enter a televised jazz contest that saw him hailed as world class by judge Joe Zawinul and immediately led to his first recording contract.

A Ronnie Scott’s Quartet gig at the pub led to a friendship. Scott was impressed with Storrer’s achievements and, as well as passing on some interesting touring artists, gave Ian an open invitation to visit his London club.

It was further recognition of the important contribution Ian Storrer and The Albert were making to jazz in the UK.

As Andy Sheppard sums it up: “People like Ian are the backbone of the music in the UK. He’s just been a rock - he’s a wonderful human being. And he really knows his music and what he’s talking about. He’s not blinkered, he’s open to all kinds of music.

“That’s the thing about places like The Albert: there seems to be some kind of special window that lets the music in.”

This article originally appeared in the October 2024 issue of Jazzwise. Never miss an issue – subscribe to Jazzwise today