For the past 21 years, the Blamey Street Big Band has been transporting audiences back to the jazz-infused swing tunes of the 1930s and ‘40s with their covers and reimaginings. Next on their hits with a twist is the biggest boy band of all time in the sold-out Blamey Street Swings with The Beatles at Harmonie German Club on Saturday 18 November.

“We have done an arrangement from every single Beatles album … There are so many fantastic tunes that work for big band tunes,” says Ian McLean, Blamey Street Big Band director of music.

Adopting themes for their two main concerts of the year, Mr McLean says many people have produced big band covers of The Beatles’ tracks and so they thought they should, too. It was by pure coincidence that the new Beatles track, Now and Then, was recently released. 

Already with a lot of the songs in their library, he says the concert wasn’t too tricky to put together, in fact they had plenty of tracks left over that wouldn’t fit in the two-hour time slot. Some of the hits to be played include I Want to Hold Your Hand, Should Have Known Better, and a Nina Simone inspired version of Penny Lane.

“One of my favourite tunes of all time is Yesterday and there is a lovely version of Something in the Way She Moves,” Mr McLean says.

Blamey Street Big Band was created by two big band musicians, who had no place to play in Canberra, and decided to start their own big band. Soon they found other musicians and a director of music in well-respected conductor, Mr McLean, who had previously been the director of music of Duntroon Royal Military College Band and the CEO of the Canberra Symphony Orchestra. Rehearsals started in a school hall on Blamey Crescent in Campbell.

“With the association of the Basin Street Blues, we couldn’t call it the Blamey Crescent Big Band, so it had to be the Blamey Street Big Band,” says Mr McLean.

Since then, the band continues to attract professional musicians, retired professional musicians, excellent amateur musicians and young players. Now rehearsing at Canberra Girls Grammar School where they also workshop with their big band, Mr McLean says it also provides the potential for students to join the semi-professional big band. Currently, four of the 20 musicians have come from the school.

“The school band system – big bands and concert bands – is very good, but once people finish playing there, the opportunities are fairly limited,” he says.

Inspired by sounds of the greats, like Count Basie and Duke Ellington, a big band is made up of five saxophones, four trumpets, four trombones and a rhythm section – piano, bass drums and guitar.

“People love listening to jazz but it is very danceable as well … Big band music is a fusion of blues and jazz. It is fairly structured, it is not as freeform as normal jazz is; big band is all read.”

Beloved vocalists like Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra and Michael Bublé all got their starts in big bands and Blamey Street has few vocalists of their own whom they rotate.

Every Wednesday of the school term, the band meets at CGGS for two hours. Together, the musicians are a team, playing together like clockwork, Mr McLean says.

“To be playing in a big band team requires a lot of different disciplines; it’s a lot of listening, coordinating with the other players, and to do that in a group of 22, is a great education for anyone interested in playing music,” he says.

The band often expands the size of their team by joining with Canberra swing dancing groups to bring a whole swing spectacle to life for audiences.

“They all get dressed up in their ‘30s and ‘40s type clothes, spats and all that sort of stuff, and then we play live swing music for them and they dance.”

Each member pays a small annual fee to play in the band, mainly to cover purchasing the rights to music. Almost all of the musicians bring their own instruments. Mr McLean says you grow to love it – some even take their trumpets to bed with them.

The big band can be seen at corporate events where they charge a fee, but when they perform at charity and community events, they do it for the love of music.

“Music is such a joyful thing and if you can use that ability to make music to bring joy to people who are listening to it, that’s a very satisfying thing and a very pleasing thing to be able to do,” smiles Mr McLean.

Already planning for their subsequent concert, Mr McLean, who likes to think out of the box with his themes, is pondering ‘an international expedition’.

“The next one will be in May or June and I’m thinking Blamey Street Goes to Paris. There are many songs about Paris – C’est si bon, C’est magnifique, the Edith Piaf songs adapt well to Big Band.”

Keep up to date with the Blamey Street Big Band via bsbb.com.au

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