Little Big Sax Appeal! Watson and Brown Little Big Band, at the Wharf Theatre, Devizes

By Ian Diddams. Images by Gail Foster

Devizonians (if that ain’t a word it is now) will undoubtedly be aware of “The Fulltone Orchestra” and its festival. They may also be aware of the “Fulltone Big Band”, especially if they attended last years August bank holiday festival. They may even be aware very recently of “The Four Sopranos”. All of these entities are separate in their own right, but share much in common, and not just personnel. There’s a general air of fun, excitement, and passion about them all. And so its no surprise at all to find that exactly the same magical recipe is rife in another associated gathering – the “Watson and Brown Little Big Band”.

The brainchild of Vicki Watson and Jemma Brown, hatched we are told over a coffee, the latest sound to hit the mean streets – or at least the arts spaces – of Devizes the “Little Big Band” broke its duck this evening at the Wharf Theatre.
Comprising of nine musicians and three singers the ensemble took us through a whirlwind two hours of jazz numbers ranging from twenties swing by Gerschwin, to seventies’ Van Morrison, to noughties modern jazz and even some Cole Porter musical theatre – and so much more. With arrangements by Vicki Watson and Simon Ridge, Jemma Brown and Sean Andrews, aided by an Moeen Ali like Ashes callup for Ed Kerr who replaced the sadly cold ridden Anthony Brown this evening, sung their way through “Route 66”, “Moondance”, “Say a Little Prayer”, “Every Time We Say Goodbye” and a male duet with “Well Did You Evah” until half time and a coffee. All interspersed with instrumentals such as “Fascinating Rhythm”, that 2008 number mentioned above “I’m dig”, “Shiny Stockings”, “Solar” and “Dat Dere”.

Vicki Watson and the Watson & Brown – Little Big Band

The second half continued in the same frenzied vein with more well known swing numbers – “Ain’t that a kick in the head”, “Me and my Shadow” (Ed in for his second spell!) , “One for my baby”, “Things” and “Straighten up and fly right”. The instrumental pieces forged on also – and we learn that maybe Miles Davies didn’t pen quite as many songs as we may think he did … and that he played piano at times under a pseudonym. “Chili Peppers”, “Undecided” and a funked-up version of “Billie’s Bounce”, gave the singers some breaks as well – but the “Little Big Band” were by no means gap fillers. This second half in particular gave the musicians longer chances for solos for our appreciation. Two trumpets (Andy Urquhart and Gethin Liddington), a trombone (Simon Ridge), three saxophones (Vicki Watson, Joe Davies, Mike Wilkins) with Vicki doubling up on flute, bass guitar and electric double bass (Ollie Watson – it’s that surname again!), with Archie Combe on keyboards (I played rugby with his dad you know!) formed this tight combo for our delectation and joy.

The overall effect was foot tappingly mesmeric. There were some hiccoughs, but its an opening night of a brand-new venture – but most and more importantly that air of fun, excitement, and passion I mentioned at the start of this review shone through above and beyond everything … and created an evening of BIG smiles, BIG sounds – and a Little BIG Band.

The “Watson and Brown Little Big Band play at the Wharf Theatre, Devizes on Friday 9th June and Saturday 10th June still, 7.30pm start.

Tickets from https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/wbbigband