Beautiful Bugs thrill Whiting Bay

On Wednesday, 9th July, the Ugly Bug Ragtime Three played a programme of highly inventive yet completely classical jazz that left their Whiting Bay audience in a state of rapture. The group’s self-mocking name gave no hint of the fine musicality that explored and extended well-loved old tunes, finding new depth of feeling in them while always staying within the known underlying theme. The three players, on this occasion sticking to the classic combination of clarinet, guitar and bass though each is a multi-instrumentalist, handed the structure of the music to each other like one of those conversations that begins, ‘Do you remember …?’ and ends in new understandings and imaginings. Yes, we remember, and it was like this, wasn’t it.