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Sunday 27 May 2012

Goodbye, Good Time George

The phone rings with news of George Melly's death. A sad day.  Jazz critics were often  sniffy about his vaudeville blues, but I never got tired of the doubles entendres and the stories about olde New Orleans. It goes without saying that Melly was a styish writer too. Owning Up, his bawdy memoir about a musician's life on the road, is a classic of its kind, and his Sixties book about pop culture and pop art, Revolt into Style, has hardly aged a bit. I only had one brief conversation with him -  I really wish I'd had a chance to get to know him better. There was one evening when I found myself walking through Soho behind him as he made his way to Ronnie Scott's in his zoot suit. I was sorely tempted to say hello, but he was too intent on humming a blues.

I put this picture on my old blog last year. I hope the photographer, David Sinclair, doesn't mind if I run it again. No zoot suit, but I think it captures the spirit of a defiant old trouper.

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