Happy New Year!!
This month sees Bryan Davis performing the last few dates of the Christmas With The Rat Pack UK tour. This will definitely be the last UK/European stint with the Rat Pack for a while. The show is on hiatus, except in the USA, until sometime later in the year, by which time Bryan should have finally made the move to New York. You can catch Bryan playing Lead Trumpet with the Rat Pack Big Band at the St Georges Hall in Bradford on the 2nd, the Grimsby Auditorium on the 3rd and the Liverpool Philharmonic on the 5th. Please stop by the Stage Door and say hello if you make it to any of these shows.
The rest of January will be spent subbing a few shows on Cinderella; the pantomime at the Alhambra Theatre, Bradford. Bryan will also be playing with the Pasadena Roof Orchestra at their concert in Leeds on the 18th. Other than that, Bryan will be catching up on real life at home! Following 38 weeks away on the road in 2008, as well as numerous other gigs, that should make for a welcome change! However, don’t be afraid to get in touch if you need a Trumpet player for your band!
Bryan is available, as ever, to teach Trumpet lessons whether at home or on the road. He is also available as Clinician and/or Guest Artist to come and work with School/Youth/College Bands. He was pleased to perform with the Jazz Band I at Fullerton College in Fullerton, California back in October 2008. He is pencilled in to coach the GCDYO Swing Band in Grimsby, UK in January this year. There will be a ‘Teaching’ page added to the site shortly with details about Bryan’s Educational activities. For more information in the meantime, please use the Contact page to get in touch.
Looking ahead, there are already some interesting gigs in Bryan’s diary for 2009. The Rat Pack – Live at the Sands US Tour starts again in late February. The show will be visiting Louisville KY, Dallas TX, Schenectady NY, Tampa Bay FL, Portland OR and Costa Mesa CA before the end of April. There are also 3 tours planned with the LACJO during 2009. There are Spring and Autumn tours in Austria and then, in late October, the band should be travelling to China to perform at the 11th China Shanghai International Arts Festival. There is a News item with more details about all of that. There is also a date with Ryan Quigley’s Big Band at the Glasgow Jazz Festival in June. Ryan is a fine Trumpet player who is well known in the Scottish Jazz scene. His band is likely to include such luminaries as Nigel Hitchcock (alto), Mark Nightingale (tbn) and possibly even Wayne Bergeron and Roger Ingram (tpts). Should be a lot of fun! Between those confirmed dates and Bryan’s emigration to the USA, it promises to be a busy year for him, so please check back here often for more news!
A highlight of 2008 was Bryan’s trip to Austria in May with Thomas Gansch and his band. The first concert was at the Schagerl Brass Festival and part of that concert is featured on the Schagerl Brass Festival 2008 DVD. One of the tracks has found it’s way on to YouTube and we present it here for your enjoyment.