43rd Australian Jazz Convention: Sydney 1988

**Beach** · 26-09-2009, 02:26

When the 43rd Annual Australian Jazz Convention was held in Sydney in December 1988 (between Boxing Day & New Years Eve - December 26-31), myself and friend, the late jazz vocalist Bobby Scott decided to have a bit of fun and put a band together in which we would do something we'd not until then done - sing duets.
This we did and jokingly called the band BOB'n'HEAD BEACH after a regular picnic haunt in Sydney, Bobbin Head.
We enlisted the aid of most of the ALL HAT JAZZ band and a few other friends and had a ball on the days we played together.
I had been co-opted less than a fortnight out from the convention to organise the drum kits, P.A. systems and piano tuning as the bloke who'd been on the committee from the outset hadn't done his job. Shirley was on the committee and I'd attended most of the meetings over the previous two years anyway with her.
I was also roped into doing much of the stage managing, along with bassist, Peter Gallen and on the same day as BOB'n'HEAD BEACH did its first spot I was back on stage again with a thrown together crew of friends that called ourselves The CONVENTION CLEANHEAD Band when a band just didn't show and we were desperate. The boys that I tracked down in the upstairs bar agreed on the proviso that I sang with them.
Fortunately, both sessions were recorded and I managed to get a hold of the tapes before they were spirited away. Hope you enjoy them! ;)

BOB'n'HEAD BEACH & the CONVENTION CLEANHEAD Band: 'Live' at Manning House - Sydney University (December 1988)