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Given the (deserved) credit with which Jake bestowed on "the band" is it not somewhat suprising that there’s really no mention (or,at least, none that I can locate) of Alan Williams ? Does anyone know how he’s doing and/or where he’s doing it ? I met him at a Jake gig in Parkgate (Wirral) and he was a really nice bloke. I do hope he’s fit and well and is aware that his contribution to Jake’s music and performance is still appreciated.
Alan Williams is, sadly, deceased, although I do not know when. I seem to recall that Jake mentions his death and how hard it hit him in the course of his Brassens interview (available for listening on this website).
Paul
It is indeed sad. He was, quite simply, a brilliant double bassist whose sympathetic playing enhances and is indeed integral to many of Jake’s finest performances.
(My first post here – may introduce myself another time 😉 )
I too am very sorry to learn that Alan Williams is no longer with us. I’m a new Thackray ‘convert’, having discovered him via the MOJO review of ‘Jake In A Box’ a few months ago.
From listening to the recordings and watching the BBC4 programmes, I was very impressed by Alan’s double-bass work with Jake, but have had no success finding any information on Alan online – I figured if you on this forum don’t know either, then no-one would…
Anyway, I’m sorry that the news wasn’t better, but it is some comfort that I am not the only reader here to note Alan’s contributions, and that they will live on in Jake’s recordings.
See you again soon – hopefully under happier circumstances 🙂
Tim
Yes.As Paul says in his posts on this topic, Jake mentions Alan in the Brassens interview which,thanks to installing "Quicktime",I have at long last been able to access.It really is quite a touching tribute from a man who clearly appreciated the other man’s talent.Watching the two of them performing together on tape from over 20 years ago it’s sobering in the extreme to realise that neither of them are around to see the love and affection generating toward them all these years later.
Paul wrote:
It is indeed sad. He was, quite simply, a brilliant double bassist whose sympathetic playing enhances and is indeed integral to many of Jake’s finest performances.
Speaking as a player of the same instrument, I’m in constant, yet pleasant, awe of AW’s basslines. Plenty going on but never trampling on the song, always supporting and enhancing.
Wonderful!B)
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