A Tribute to Chris Barber OBE [17/03/1930 – 02/03/2021]

It was the MJQ pianist John Lewis who urged Chris Barber to bring the great bluesman Muddy Waters over to Britain. No sooner said than done, for Waters [and his pianist Otis Spann] literally electrified audiences in 1958, backed by Barber’s resolutely New Orleans style jazz band. If trad purists were shocked, young enthusiasts like Peter Green and Eric Clapton were entranced, some dating their involvement in r&b and rock from hearing Waters and the other African American blues artists that Barber brought to Britain.

While the other star names of the so-called ‘Trad Boom’ pretty well stuck to the tried and tested, Barber was always open to other possibilities. He was ready to co-operate with radical thinkers like altoist Joe Harriot or to tour with the riveting gospel singer Sister Rosetta Tharpe and then to invite rockers like Andy Fairweather-Low or Van Morrison to appear with the band. More recently he had adopted a flexible approach to his concert presentations, performing regularly as the Big Chris Barber Band, his normal six-piece augmented by additional musicians as they tackled early Ellington classics or re-fashioned contemporary pieces like ‘All Blues’ in their own idiosyncratic manner.

Donald Christopher Barber was the son of left-leaning, high-achieving parents and came upon jazz as a wartime evacuee, completing his education at St Paul’s School. Destined to be an actuary, he chose instead to pursue his delight in traditional jazz, forming his first amateur band in 1949. Having studied trombone and bass at the Guildhall [he had played violin from the age of seven] he turned professional in 1952. When the arch-purist, cornetist Ken Colyer, returned from New Orleans in 1953, he joined Barber and clarinettist Monty Sunshine to form the Ken Colyer Jazzmen, their skiffle group giving band guitarist Lonnie Donegan career-defining success with ‘Rock Island Line’, the band’s LPs selling well until Ken’s stern demands led to a split and he departed. Barber was voted in as leader, with replacement trumpeter Pat Halcox as his long-term collaborator.

Their million-selling single of Sidney Bechet’s ‘Petite Fleur’, which featured Sunshine’s gorgeous clarinet, brought the band international acclaim and led to several successful US tours, the presence of the lusty-voiced Ottilie Patterson who had joined the band [and married Barber in 1959] a key added attraction. Her blues singing even won over the African American crowd when they visited Muddy Waters’ club in Chicago. As the decades passed, Barber added musicians like the blues guitarist John Slaughter, touring as the Chris Barber Jazz and Blues Band, his popularity undimmed, the albums accruing, often made with US artists, his trombone style seldom changing: uncluttered, hard-swinging, musically apt and always hot.

Invariably business-like not to say single-minded, Barber co-owned the Marquee Club with promoter Harold Pendleton and they co-founded the Reading Blues and Jazz Festival [now the Reading Festival]. Known for his encyclopaedic knowledge of early jazz and his substantial collection of vintage 78rpm records, Barber oversaw CD compilations for Timeless Records and broadcast regularly, the band also appearing in numerous films.

Barber was made OBE in 1991 and granted an Honorary Doctorate: his autobiography Jazz Me Blues appeared in 2014.  

He loved cars and raced a Lotus IX. Married four times, and having run his band continuously from 1954 until 2019, he stood down when his health began to fail and dementia set in. RIP Chris Barber.