ALAN -

Maine Street Jazzmen

Double Bass (born. Tyneside, Apr 53 )

                                                                         Alan comes from a musical family, as his father Norman played  jazz piano with the Tyneside based Panama Jazzmen.  So it comes as no surprise that his early days were filled with the sounds of  Fats Waller, Erroll Garner, Teddy Wilson, Art Tatum,  Louis Armstrong, Bix Beiderbecke, etc, etc

After initial outings on clarinet aged about seven, Alan took up guitar at school and became interested in playing blues guitar. However this interest in Blues guitar led to the discovery of the guitar music of  Django Reinhardt, Eddy Lang, Wes Montgomery, Joe Pass etc. 

After playing guitar for a while, he became interested in playing jazz bass, firstly on bass guitar, and then later on double bass

Alan has listened to many bass players over the years, but he lists his main influences on record as,Bob Haggart (Bob Crosby, Lawson Haggart band, & Worlds Greatest Jazz Band) , Ray Brown (Oscar Peterson Trio, Gene Harris Trio), Israel Crosby (Ahmad Jamal Trio) , Paul Chambers (Miles Davis) & George Mraz (Tommy Flanagan Trio)

Alan currently plays a German Double Bass, using Acoustic Image/Gallien Kreuger amplification. Correli tungsten strings, and  K & K Bass Max, and Schaller pickups.