The Scotsman Sessions #104: Brian Kellock

This article contains affiliate links. We may earn a small commission on items purchased through this article, but that does not affect our editorial judgement.

Welcome to The Scotsman Sessions. With the performing arts world shutting down for the foreseeable future, we are commissioning a series of short video performances from artists all around the country and releasing them on scotsman.com, with introductions from our critics. Here, jazz pianist Brian Kellock plays two Irving Berlin standards: No Strings (I’m Fancy Free), memorably sung and danced by Fred Astaire in Top Hat, and No Business Like Show Business from Annie Get Your Gun.

In these times of doom and gloom, reckons Brian Kellock, we need more of the likes of Fred Astaire and Irving Berlin. The widely acclaimed pianist, in demand to perform and record with names as diverse as Liane Carroll, Sheila Jordan, Julian Arguelles, Tommy Smith and the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, is steeped in classic jazz and has chosen a couple of Irving Berlin standards for his Scotsman Session.

“I was in St Andrews recently and in a second-hand bookshop I picked up this book, Ninety Golden Years of Irving Berlin, although I know most of the songs anyway,” he says. Consequently, he’s chosen the songs No Strings (I’m Fancy Free, memorably sung and danced by Fred Astaire in Top Hat), and No Business Like Show Business from Annie Get Your Gun.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“I’ve got a great album of Astaire singing songs like that with the Oscar Peterson Trio. I just thought we could do with some feel-good just now.” In fact, Kellock’s 1998 debut album with his long-time collaborators bassist Kenny Ellis and drummer John Rae, was a collection of Astaire numbers, Something’s Got To Give.

Kellock has an elegantly considered way with a good melody, which shines from his enthusiastically received solo album of last year, Bidin’ My Time, but he can also dazzle and has been working on his stride piano chops during lockdown. Once able to get back into the studio he hopes to make a duo album of vintage jazz with saxophonist and clarinettist John Burgess.

During lockdown, the pianist hasn’t done much streaming from his home in Glasgow until now – “I got bamboozled by the technology” – and finds the process of playing to an invisible audience (as he did during the recent online Glasgow Jazz festival) disheartening: “You get no feedback, no interaction with the punters, but it’s playing with other musicians that I miss most.”

For more on Brian Kellock, visit https://www.facebook.com/bkjazzpiano

A message from the Editor

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Thank you for reading this story on our website. While I have your attention, I also have an important request to make of you.

The dramatic events of 2020 are having a major impact on many of our advertisers - and consequently the revenue we receive. We are now more reliant than ever on you taking out a digital subscription to support our journalism.

To subscribe to scotsman.com and enjoy unlimited access to Scottish news and information online and on our app, visit https://www.scotsman.com/subscriptions

Joy Yates, Editorial Director

Related topics:
Dare to be Honest
Follow us
©National World Publishing Ltd. All rights reserved.Cookie SettingsTerms and ConditionsPrivacy notice