Great performer photos on Flickr

VJzoo has put up a bunch of great photo's of musicians performing at The Ellington.
Take a look over at VJzoo's photostream.

Some musings by Alex Millier on the monthly Chamber Jam

Shamelessly re-quoting from Alex Millier's blog:

“Chamber Jam is the new once a month feature on Monday night at The Ellington Jazz Club. The second gig in June features the electrifying Tetrafide percussion group. Tetrafide Percussion is Australia’s hottest young percussion group. Their east-meets-west, power-packed concerts have left audiences worldwide awestruck."

Read the rest of the entry story over at AlexMillier.com
Alex is a regular performer at The Ellington.

Sweet Ellington photos by Jase Chong

Perth blogger Jase Chong, has put up some nice photos he took of The Ellington last month.

His entry on his 8 year old daughters Masterchef antics are also well worth a read, her Caregg recipe is um.. interesting.

D

Blog review of The Ellington

There is a great review of The Ellington by Matt over at Abstract Gourmet. Including some fantastic photos of the club and our amazingly attractive crew.

Disclaimer: Matt is a member and regular at The Ellington, you can usually find him hiding front and centre at the tables brandishing a serious looking DSLR.

abstractgourmet.com/2009/05/the-ellington/

D

Wine tasting for the new list

Of the 50 wines tasted, in categories such as 'Australian Sauvignon Blanc + blends', 'NZ Sauvignon Blanc', 'Pinot Gris', 'Aromatic Whites', 'Chardonnay', 'Rose', 'Shiraz' and 'Cabernet', there were very few poor quality wines, and some exceptional stand-outs. Of course the New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs were received really well, but the surprise win of the whites was a Gewurtztraminer - all aromatic nose, sweet juicy lime and peach, with a long minerally backbone. Keep an eye on the next list for that one, for sure. The win of the reds was a WA Cabernet Malbec - all rich juice and spiced, tobaccoey length. Yum.

We tasted the wines masked (the wines were masked, not the tasters) with a range of palates from casual drinkers to professional industry tasters. The results show us that the wines that are technically sound are very often the wines that are most appealing to all. We approached the tasting professionally, and everyone was still lucid by the end of the 50th - of course, by then, with 50 bottles open, the same can't be said for two hours later...! And even later, there may have been pool-side shenanigans, though there is thankfully no photographic evidence (yet...).

LD

Deep in thought

A seven for taste.

Blind bottles, mental note next time don't use newspaper, black hands.

Dinner #1 of 2 - have to keep the crew sober (ish)

Waiting for the non-tasters to show up to start on all those 1/2 empties

Few drinks down

Jovial

Just getting started...

First Soho nights success

About fifty people enjoyed a fun time with Libby Hammer and her selection of cabaret, Cole Porter and risque songs such as the wonderfully entertaining The Masochistic Tango.

The mood was relaxed and friendly, and we ran until 12:30 before closing the bar. That was a decent start, considering the night of the week, but considering the size of the queer community in Perth we expect it to get much bigger.

LD

Interestingly, today and last night, the blog entries and Twitter tweets about this night by far (and we mean by far) outnumbered any other event yet held at The Ellington. With that word of mouth (everyone loved it) we suspect next fortnights Soho nights will be a lot bigger.

DB

Rising star ascends to The Ellington Stage

Sensational new vocal talent Shameem Taheri-Lee will be providing a musical treat this Thursday night at the Ellington Jazz Club. A rising star in the Perth jazz scene, Shameem will be leading an all star jazz combo to create a musical smorgasbord that will delight any listener.

With a warm and soulful voice, when Shameem sings she seems to speak directly to the hearts of her audience. Whether you’re a jazz fan or just a lover of good music, you’re bound to enjoy this performance. Shameem enjoys taking familiar tunes and giving them her own distinct flavour. So don’t be surprised if you come across a pop-rock hit and a Nova Scotia folk song back-to-back, both miraculously transformed.

“I grew up surrounded by many different styles of music: from classical and show tunes to disco and funk,” says Shameem, “and I learnt to love all good music as good music, no matter what genre you might label it.

“I’m very excited to be performing at such a fine venue as the Ellington for the first time.” The Ellington Jazz Club is Perth’s most exciting, new live music venue and set to be Australia's finest jazz club and a cultural institution in Perth city.

Shameem will be performing with her quintet on Thursday 16th April, 8:30pm.

Order Tickets Online

Inaugural Soho Nights Tonight

On Tuesday 14 April we will be hosting the inaugural Soho Nights, a night at The Ellington featuring Jazz and Caberet acts in a fun evening for the gay and lesbian community.

The one and only Libby Hammer will kick off the series with a range of Cole Porter and cabaret classics.

If you miss this one, the next Soho nights will be in a fortnight on Tuesday 28 April featuring Ali Bodycoat.

Awesome Sunday Times Coverage

We were part of an awesome six page spread plus front page in the Sunday Times glossy STM Magazine last weekend.

The article was about the rising Jazz scene in Perth and how The Ellington was part of it.

A great read, we will get a scan up in the Media section of the website soon hopefully.

Twitter and Tweeting

We jumped on the Twitter bandwagon a few weeks back, along with the rest of the world from what it seems.
Not quite sure how it is going to fit in the promotional mix but we are trialing it with daily announcements of the acts.

Think:

"Tonight - Mark Fitzgibbon trio from 9.00pm... Mark is from Melbourne but at WAAPA for 2009 as guest lecturer - one of Australia's finest"

If follower numbers are any indication there is certainly interest, within two tweets we had a few dozen followers with no promotion anywhere.

If anyone has any Tweet content ideas I would love to hear them in the comments.

Become a follower of @theellington on Twitter here.

Getting time to blog and media coverage.

Well it has been a few crazy weeks since the opening. Everything is going better that expected and blogging was something that fell by the way. We are now going to start some scheduled blogging to keep everyone up to date on whats happening.

In the meantime we have recieved heaps of fantastic press coverage.
We have put scans of many of the articles on the website here.

Tonight we have Ali Bodycoat Quartet

Ali has performed at the Perth Jazz Society, Jazz Fremantle, Perth and Fremantle Festivals and worked consistently in Musical Theatre with yellow glass theatre inc since studying at the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts in 2002.

Ali has held a trio residency with Graham Wood and other venerable Perth Jazz musicians such as Sam Anning, Dane Alderson and Carl Mackey at the Subiaco Hotel for thirteen years, supported Vince Jones, Grace Knight and Marcia Hynes and consistently works with the state’s top Jazz Musicians.

Tables have sold out already for her 8:30 performance but bar entry is still available for the usual $10

3 nights of international acts this week

Don't forget this week on Thursday night the legendary US pianist Kirk Lightsey teaming up with Australian Jazz legend Bernie McGann. The rhythm section will be Andrew Dickensen and Brendan Clarke (both from Sydney)

Friday and Saturday features the legendary Grammy award winning UK guitarist Martin Taylor with Alison Burns on vocals

Opening week success

Hi to all the fantastic supporters who showed up this week. The turnout over five nights was really amazing - we were at capacity most of the time with a queue down the street for a large amount of time.

Still some bugs to iron out but an overall success

This week we are straight back into it with 5 nights of music from Wednesday to Sunday.

Opening week launches

After 2 years of preparation we are almost there with the opening of The Ellington Jazz Club. There have been many many hurdles along the way and I can certainly say that it is far from easy to open a venue in this town. In fact sometimes it appears the whole system is set up to say no and not support any new initiatives in any way shape or form...

Anyway - it's time to party so come on down