BELL JAZZ LECTURES

The  Doubly Gifted  Committee and  Waverley  Library named  this lecture series  on jazz the Bell Jazz Lectures, in  honour of Graeme Bell's outstanding contribution to jazz in  Australia and abroad  over  the previous 50 years.   He was an outstanding pianist, excellent band  leader, and composer of note, who died on June 13, 2012. Graeme was also  a talented artist who  exhibited in the Doubly Gifted exhibitions of visual art works by jazz musicians, as well as contributing to other  exhibitions. The series began in 1993 and concluded in 2014. Read these lectures also at www.waverley.nsw.gov.au/services/library/reference_library/doubly_gifted_annual_bell_jazz_lectures

JAZZ: A QUESTION OF GROWTH, OR SURVIVAL OF THE HIPPEST?

by Judy Bailey

Fourth annual Bell Jazz Lecture delivered September 28, 1996 at Waverley Library

Any consideration of evolutionary trends must, of necessity, involve the historical perspective, so let's go back in time, and examine the very beginning of musical sound production. It seems likely that our earliest forbears, having discovered the use of their own particular personal instrument, ie the VOICE, were then inspired and compelled to emulate the sounds they heard around them - the natural sounds of wind and water, birds and trees, animals and stones…

WHITHER JAZZ?

by Clement Semmler

Fifth Annual Bell Jazz Lecture delivered September 20, 1997 at Waverley Library

This event gives me the opportunity to salute Graeme Bell on this, the 50th anniversary of two most notable landmarks in the history of Australian jazz, of which he was the protagonist. His Dixieland Jazz Band in April 1947 recorded six sides on the old 78 format for EMI, issued on the Regal-Zonophone label. This was the first professionally recorded jazz in Australia. I remember them well…

JAZZ: WHAT'S IN A NAME?

by Geoff Bull

Sixth Annual Bell Jazz Lecture delivered September 19, 1998 at Waverley Library

I am honoured to have been chosen to deliver this lecture, as I am to have had a long association with Graeme Bell both musically and personally. He continues to give longevity a good name and is an example to all of us. I hope my chosen topic strikes a chord with him and I am sure he has been asked this question: what do you do?