Al Hood, Reporter
The final event of the opening day's marvelous activities was a jazz quartet set by jazz and lead trumpeter Eddie Severn (from Coventry, England) in Royal Northern College's Studio Theatre, which was set up to have the ambience of a jazz club with about 20 tables, a bar and some nice stage lighting. Eddie Severn and the conference rhythm section of Andy Kingslow-piano; Pete Turner-bass; and Eryl Roberts-drums, took the stage at about 11:45 pm having just met! Severn commented on how quiet it was! These folks were here to listen.
The attendees were treated to an hour's set of great standard jazz tunes kicking off with Miles Davis' Milestones. Severn demonstrated his powerful tone and deft solo idea building, eventually developing into a series of cascading eighth notes. The next selection was Horace Silver's Song for My Father, which started with a rhythm section intro and went into a head modulating into different key centers - an interesting way to explore this song! 
Severn displayed a nice mix of laid back eighth note style and double-timing. Kingslow played a funky piano solo and Roberts had some nice fills on the drums with the soloists. The whole tune concluded with a funky vamp in the rhythm section. At this point, trumpeter Claudio Roditi sat down at a table front and center, to enjoy the program after having just finished his own appearance with the BBC Big Band.
The next tune was an original written by one of Severn's friends, Brant Kellock. It was entitled Duddingston Loch, a place in Edinburgh where Kellock used to go as a boy. This was a melodic, medium tempo jazz waltz on flugelhorn. The tune features really nice chord changes. The piano and bass both took solo choruses and Eddie demonstrated his control of the upper register on flugelhorn. Next up was a blues tune, Straight, No Chaser by Thelonious Monk. A short intro was followed by the head. Severn went into his solo laying down some great time, while employing some excellent inflections and effective chromatic turns. The piano solo exhibited some nice "Monk-isms" and the piano, trumpet, and drums traded fours for two choruses before taking it out.
The next tune was an original ballad written by one of Severn's friends in Prague (whom he called Frank for lack of a better pronunciation of his name!) titled Heart to Heart. The pianist, Kingslow, made excellent use of dynamic contrast in his solo, and Severn's improvisation went from a ballad to a more medium swing approach. The bassist took an effective solo bringing the work to its close. The last tune of this short set was a very brisk Autumn Leaves and featured each of the musicians who participated in this after hours event. Eddie Severn thanked the audience and the tired, but satisfied delegates left, a swinging conclusion to what proved to be a fantastic day of trumpeting!
