[Dixielandjazz] Jim Galloway

[ROBERT R. CALDER]

Jim had headed across the Atlantic before I heard of, let alone heard him, though unhappily for me he was out of town during my one stay in his later hometown of Toronto, where he married  the daughter of the city's "Legit" musical society with whom he worked in Edinburgh in the 1980s on a crossover sort of project involving the Official Edinburgh Festival and the city's "Legit" musical society in a concert in the Usher Hall. 


He had to reorganise his appearance at one of the regular jazz festival gigs I attended, in a hotel near Haymarket station, turning up for a couple of numbers  before rushing back to the hall for rehearsals.  He liked laughing and had a very infectious laugh and sense of humour.  At maybe a later festival he unfortunately didn't have time to get to a comedy show (festival fringe, no music) somebody asked me to look in on regarding worthiness for an award.  He could have joined in, the humour being ethnic, demotic, in the same vein as his reminiscences at various gigs, odd things he remembered from before he escaped. 


The co-operative stores (Coe in the West, Cope in Perth, etc.) gave members a subsequent rebate as a percentage of cash expended on goods. The DIVIDEND.  Jim was rocking about with laughter remembering a sales slogan on the lines of "The More You Eat, the Bigger the Dividend!" (Forget how much money you leave in the shop -- I seem to remember that some of that money flowed away in mysterious directions....too). A good ear and eye for absurdities as well as good music!


It's not directly Jim, but the opening number at the Haymarket hotel gig (was the drummer called Mathieson?)  had a couple of hiccups due to a pioneering nuisance with a mobile 'phone or bleeper.  After this seemed to have been sorted, Al Casey with a butter wouldn't melt expression on his face demonstrated the acuteness of his ears and his fingers with a note-perfect bleep from his guitar which added to the look of distress on Jane Jarvis's face as she continued to impress people who'd never heard of her, let alone heard her play piano. Dear lady, her jaw dropped remarkably low as Al, whose bleep mimicry had knocked a string out of tune, retuned while still playing. I think she was on the edge of her seat with the chords of some numbers, but getting them right, but this sudden beam up of a chord that was still sounding bred a look of desperation, but all in a spirit of delight. Jim played his features, especially acclaimed by Joe Dunn, Glasgow soft
 drink impresario and importer of Guinness, who hovered about as Jim's greatest fan, and was off back to the concert hall. 


For much deep fun infinite thanks!

Robert R. Calder