Sandy Brown Jazz

[Some computers might ask you to allow the music to play on this page]

The monthly Tea Break is a series of short, fun items in What's New Magazine
that also gives jazz musicians an opportunity to update us with what they are doing.

Carl Spencer, cornet, with Spencer's Washboard Kings in 1966

Here are Spencer's Washboard Kings playing I Need Some Pettin' in the 1960s.

In 1969 the BBC televised a concert from the Hammersmith Palais to mark the 50th anniversary of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band’s first performance there, and Carl's band, Spencer’s Washboard Kings, helped recreate the original ODJB sounds from some fifty years earlier.

Spencer's Washboard Kings had become a popular UK band akin to the Temperence Seven. They are pictured here in 1968 during a summer season at the Central Pier, Blackpool.

For Carl, it all began in the early 1960s at the Thames Hotel in Hampton Court in the London borough of Richmond On Thames: ‘I used to go there either late ‘50s or ’60/61. At the time I worked in the Eastbourne branch of the National Provincial Bank, but was sent off for “Relief Work” at other branches. Staines was one of them, and I would go on Sunday nights to the Thames Hotel to see the Original Downtown Syncopators, a 5 piece outfit re-creating the ODJB music and run by Barry Dunning who later started the London City Agency with Johnny Jones, the ex-trumpeter of the London City Stompers. It was the Original Downtown Syncopators who inspired me to take up cornet (I played piano, but badly!) and to start my own band - Spencer’s Washboard Kings in 1964.’

A Pathé news video featuring the Original Downtown Syncopators in 1962.

‘I left the bank in August that year. After obtaining various semi-pro gigs, some obtained by the London City Agency, they offered to let me take over the Original Downtown Syncopators' outstanding bookings. I had “stolen” two of their latter day players, Brian Hills, clarinet, and Bill Shortt, percussion, so we were billed as Spencer’s Washboard Kings “Formerly the Original Downtown Syncopators”.

‘We went pro in May ’65 with 30 gigs that month, plus a TV spot on The Whole Scene’s Going, a kind of Top of the Pops show, to promote a tongue in cheek single on the Polydor label, also released in May - Masculine Women Feminine Men - it would be quite inappropriate today.’

Listen to the Washboard Kings' version of Frankie Trumbauer and Bix Beiderbecke's recording of Borneo.

‘We ran for eight years, changed personnel a lot over the time, and expanded our repertoire to include quite advanced Fletcher Henderson / McKinney’s Cotton Pickers, etc. arrangements. In 1968 we had also expanded to an 8-piece band (four piece front line, with two reeds, cornet and trombone) on the back of a well-paid very long Blackpool Summer Season. In all we broadcast over 400 numbers through various shows with Jimmy Young, Terry Wogan, Pete Brady, Late Night Line Up, Humph’s Jazz Club etc. as well as touring many times on the Continent’

Spencer's Washboard Kings playing The Darktown Strutters' Ball

In September 1972, Carl Spencer decided to wind up the band when he became Deputy Managing Director of the UK Yamaha musical instrument distribution company. He was with Yamaha for fourteen years until 1986 when he founded his own UK distribution company handling, Hammond Organs, Kurzweil, Goldstar Keyboards, GEM and others. In 1993 / 94 Carl took on the management of the Charleston Chasers band, assisting them in turning professional, securing a recording contract and helping them find gigs in the UK.

A year later, in September 1995, Carl sold his music business and moved to Sussex. He decided to start playing again and in 1997 he launched a new band, Spencer’s Nighthawks which included four members of the original Spencer’s Washboard Kings. They played a wide variety of venues and events nationwide, meeting and making old friends and new.

Carl now lives in the Scottish Highlands, far from the glitz and glamour of those heady days of the 1960s, but until the Coronavirus pandemic, he was still bringing a band together.

Carl linked up for a virtual Tea Break during the second England Coronavirus ‘lock down’

Hi Carl, How are you? What have you got there, tea or coffee? Are you tempted to put a ‘wee dram’ in it?

Hi Ian, yes at the moment, as its 6.30pm, although I’m normally more of a coffee drinker. Made tea on behalf of my wife, so joined in for a cup. No I’m not a general dram-adder!

How are things in Scotland with your five tier Coronavirus system there? I guess being in The Highlands you are well enough ‘socially distanced’ anyway?

Well, although it seemed my area of the Highlands had been free of the virus, I read there had been two cases back in September - a schoolboy at the Dornoch Academy and a close colleague of his. Both had been isolated immediately and apparently no more cases have occurred up here. There has been one more schoolboy in Tain, 10 miles south, detected on November 5th, and he has been isolated along with his contacts. They are awaiting information on whether they have also caught him in time. I live in a Lodge-type unit on a private Park, and we are reasonably distanced from the next unit.

It has been frustrating for musicians who have been unable to play over the past months. So different from when the Washboard Kings were playing! By the way, why did you choose to include the name ‘Washboard’ in your band’s title?

The 1920s Chicago South-Side style played by small black bands, generally involved washboards as they give a lighter, more driving sound. Added to them is the rest of a “Traps” set….cymbals, woodblock and temple blocks ... as well as in many occasions a bass drum, used sparingly, not as a 4/4 constant thump!. There were many bands incorporating the name washboard in them. Often it was the piano giving a strong vamping background, together with a washboard and “traps”. Invariably the piano was an upright, well tuned, and very big, perhaps 5 foot high, which means a long length of string, and soundboard, so it gives bigger sound.

Carl with percusionist / washboard player Mick Panter

For example, Ian, Listen to this sample with Johnny Dodds with Jimmy Bertrand’s Washboard Wizards - Jimmy Blythe piano, Dodds clarinet, Bertrand washboard and traps, there were no cymbals used. You’ll see that these recordings are sometime referred to as by the ‘Johnny Dodds Trio’

I can't believe how long it is since I heard that, Carl! It's a recording I have always enjoyed - really catchy.

We once recorded one of these numbers – Ape Man - in a West Country studio and were horrified to find they only had a digital piano in the studio. It gave a rather thin backing sound.

Another point about washboards was that the Skiffle craze, which also used them, had only been a few years before, and there were several skiffle bands like Lonnie Donegan’s playing on the Northern Working Men’s Club circuit, and I felt that to incorporate washboard in our name might help. I remember one club we played, and the manager, in a strong Yorkshire accent, said “I didn’t realise you were real musicians” which rather summed up his opinion of the other “Washboard” outfits on the circuit.

Lonnie Donegan singing Cumberland Gap.

We had also played around London in late 1964 under various Washboard names –the Washboard Serenaders, the Washboard Syncopators, etc., attempting to create an image that washboard bands were all the rage. As we progressed musically, incorporating most of the ‘20s styles, I eventually changed the name when I reformed in late 1996 after a 24 year break. 

You told me about how you went to the Thames Hotel in Hampton Court in the 1950s while doing relief work for your Eastbourne bank. Did you grow up in Eastbourne? You say you learned to play piano – that was down in East Sussex I guess?

We moved to Eastbourne when I was nearly four, and I leant basic classical piano at prep school. I had just one further term of piano after entering Eastbourne College, and then no interest in furthering classical studies. This was the early Elvis Presley/Bill Haley days and I was caught in the wave of enthusiasm for that, along with a fascination of the Ragtime influenced Winifred Attwell piano style. I started to buy bits of her sheet music and dabble at it. Then came jazz on the radio, Humphrey Lyttleton,  Terry Lightfoot, etc., and then the Temperance Seven had a breakthrough hit and jazz was everywhere. I started going to the local jazz clubs and jazz lectures, and began collecting. 

Can you remember the atmosphere at the Thames Hotel and what inspired you to take up the cornet then? Where did you get your first cornet?

Yes, I was really impressed by the whole atmosphere, there. It was crammed with people, many of whom were jiving, and the band, the Original Downtown Syncopators, showed me what could be done if you applied yourself. I had also met Brian Hills who was recently out of the Air Force and was going to local jazz clubs. He would sit-in with the Dolphin band of Hastings - their cornet player, Pete Treger, influenced me very much, he was an Oliver/Armstrong/George Mitchell/Jabbo Smith style player, and well versed in Classic jazz. He was also away at Uni where no doubt he gained more experience through meeting others. He inspired me to buy my first, very old cornet from the Ocklygne Music Shop in Eastbourne .... that must have been around 1960. I found that the piano knowledge help a lot with the cornet, as I already knew about scales and arpeggios etc., I just had to deal with the technical side of blowing!

It was only three years later that you started up the Washboard Kings with Brian Hills and Bill Shortt. What had been happening during those three years while you were learning to play – you must have had regular contact with the Original Dowtown Syncopators?

When I was eventually moved by the bank to the Isle of Wight, I joined the Medina City Jazzmen on piano, that must have been in 1961. Their trumpet guy left to join the Merchant Navy and I bought a new trumpet with a £20 loan from the bank. I was living in digs, spent the winter practising, and then presented myself to the band as their new trumpet player in April 1964. We had a very busy summer playing Holiday Camps etc., and I asked the bank for a move to London in August. After two months I had formed the nucleus of the Washboard Kings with Brian Hills and his friend Bill Shortt, who played washboard and traps, and was currently playing in the ODS, we had been in close contact all the time.

The personnel of the Kings changed over the years – can you remember the line-up of the original band?

It was some of Bill’s friends, Stan Hayward who played piano, later to join the newly formed New Vaudeville Band, who were in the early Washboard Kings. Stan was on piano, he was also a wonderful arranger - all head-arrangements, nothing written then!. Chris Eady, another friend of Bill’s was on banjo and vocals, Bill was on percussion, Ian Hills on sousaphone – he was also an excellent classical tuba player, Brian Hills on clarinet and alto, Bob Kerr on soprano, alto, baritone and second cornet and myself on cornet and later vocals. That was the original line-up late 1964 and continued to March 1966.

Going professional in 1965 must have been exciting. It was a time though that pop music was taking over with the Beatles and Stones. Why do you think the Washboard Kings managed to go on being successful and busy when other trad bands were beginning to struggle?

Looking back, we had been approached by Barry Dunning of the Original Downtown Syncopators to take over their outstanding bookings and he, with Johnny Jones of the London City Agency, also managed us. We had kept in touch with the ODS as Brian and Bill were playing with them over their last years, and we knew a lot of their material, so it was logical, and we were billed as "Formerly the Original Downtown Syncopators”. We did a lot of comedy to begin with, so we weren’t just a “Trad” band. Also we had a genuine 1920s sound like that of the Temperance Seven, that put us apart from those Trad bands who were all playing ‘Banjo- to- the- fore’ rhythm sound.

We were a very across-the board band, covering all '20s and early '30s styles .... well, we were only an 8 piece so there were limits! For quite a period we had a pianist who doubled on cornet simultaneously ... left hand piano, right hand trumpet. Useful for intros and endings and bridge passages, where an extra voice fattens the sound. In a studio setting he could cut in a second trumpet part later, as with the Oliver/Armstrong numbers. We could handle 10 piece arrangements OK. dropping out the 3rd sax and 2nd trumpet, except where it was really  beneficial and then pianist Henry Davies would play it.

Hang on, Carl, I need a coffee top up and a biscuit. Are you indulging in Scottish shortbread or do you have another favourite snack?

I'll make another cup too. No, I don't have shortbread - I have a particularly soft spot for dark chocolate ginger biscuits.

Personally, I think ginger biscuits are the best for 'dunking' but I can't imagine dunking ones with chocolate on.

You must have made a lot of contacts with other jazz people during the time of the Washboard Kings. Do any memories stand out? If you could ‘magic’ one of them back to join us for our Tea Break, who would it be?

We knew many other bands and I remember Alex Welsh’s drummer, Lenny Hastings, saying to our drummer, when he looked at our 1920s kit at a broadcast from the Hammersmith Palais in ’69 - “I don’t know how you know what not to hit”. That broke us up! The other strong memory is from when Ben Webster came to see us in Copenhagen in November 1971. He loved the fact that we were playing arrangements he had played in Henderson’s band in the early '30s. We had a great chat: “Well what do ya know! I'se comes here and whaddo I find. Eight white dudes playing ma stuff” He loved it.. I guess he would be the one I would like to re-materialise.

What would you ask him?

General musical chat with Ben Webster would be great with him again. There are others, but I am sure that would be enough!

Ben Webster

There is a nice video online of your 1969 recording of Ordinary People. It’s a good song – is that you singing? I had left London by then, but I remember the flares and the bright coloured clothes that we wore.

No, that wasn’t me singing on Ordinary People, it’s the guy who wrote the song, I think that was Geoff Stephens. We recorded it as a one-off - like Winchester Cathedral was a hit when the New Vaudeville Band was formed to tour.

The video of Ordinary People.

When you left to join Yamaha and then your own company, you were still connected to music, did your jazz interests change? Did you still get to gigs?

I stopped playing completely in 1972 when I entered the Music Industry, I couldn’t trust myself to concentrate on business otherwise! Yes, I enjoyed widening my musical knowledge, for example there were some very good organ players - jazz and other styles - about.

What made you want to start up playing again with the Spencer’s Nighthawks Orchestra? Presumably, the Coronavirus put a stop to gigs as it has for many. Do you have plans for the future?

I started again in 1996 after retiring early the year before but currently no chance of any music up here yet, until Covid lifts.

Spencer's Nighthawks having fun with Never Swat A Fly at the Bude Jazz Festival in 2001

That clip of Never Swat A Fly looks as though you were having a good time with the band.

Oh yes! There were many good times with both bands. I remember one incident in late ’65 or early ’66 when we had a one and a half decker airport bus, with berths and kitchen fitted. I snaffled the huge rear-doors compartment, had a double mattress and sleeping bag laid out in there, as well as all the band gear being stashed and lashed up against the rear bulkhead. I had my own fixed light too.

Then there was the time when we were somewhere right up north going across from Carlisle to Newcastle, I think, and we had a piston head disintegrate. Bob Kerr got under the bus, dropped the sump, disconnected the big end bearing on the affected piston, slipped the collapsed piston down plus all the bits and pieces of rubbish, re-fitted the sump cover, poured the collected-in-sump oil back in the oil filler, started the bus up, and we drove on 5 cylinders, or it could have been 7, I’ve forgotten. We did all the next gigs on our gradual way down south where it was then deposited it with our garage guy near Balham for repair. Bob was that sort of guy…action, action….and get it sorted straight away.

And then I know the new ’97 band are mainly ingrained in my wife’s brain, as we used to put most of them up, for both rehearsals and south-east area gigs. Lovely sight to have snoring musicians in your sitting room etc in the mornings! Mike Parle at least passed on his coffee making skills……always stir the coffee in the cafetiere with a table knife, to enable it to “draw” properly. We still do that today! Several tracks on our CDs were recorded in ‘99 in the airy sitting room, with me and mixing desk in the adjacent dining room.

I bet most bands treasure memories like that, Carl. Looking back further to your first inspirations of early jazz – the ODJB, McKinney’s Cotton Pickers, Bix and others, how about choosing a track that we can finish up our tea break with?

I’d love to hear OK Baby by McKinneys although there are loads of others. I think it encapsulates the very best of the ‘20s feel.

Here it comes

Thanks for sharing a tea break, Carl. Stay safe and well and keep warm up there.

Spencer's Nighthawks in 2018

Click here for Spencer's Nighthawks website

Back to Top

Visit us on Facebook

Other pages you might find of interest :

Click HERE to join our mailing list

© Sandy Brown Jazz