Bassist
Bass Geek alert. I love being a bassist.
Currently, performance focus is on the Bancroft & Lyne duo and a new recording I have done with Dave Milligan over at Castlesound studio with Gary Boyle in the engineer’s chair. I have also been busy withguitarist Kyle Irwin, recording a collection of his originals and then heading out the Jazz Bar (Jan 25th at 9:30PM) in Edinburgh to play a gig with this merry band featuring: Kyle Irwin – Guitar, Tom Lyne- Bass, Alan Benzie- Piano, Jose Girgis- Saxophone, and Dan shearer – Drums.
I teach both privately and through institutions such as Napier University, University of Aberdeen, Edinburgh College, and Perth College, as well as workshops and masterclasses like the Napier Jazz Summerschool.
One of my great loves is working with vocalists which began as a teenager when I met Sheila Jordan who, at the time, was performing with just a double bass player – I was hooked. In Scotland, I began working, originally, with Sophie Bancroft at the Fionna Duncan Vocal Jazz Workshops, and that has since evolved into a collection of other workshops that involve teaching alongside Sophie Bancroft, Liane Carroll, Sara Coleman, and Brian Kellock
There were a couple of Dave Milligan Trio performances during lockdown.
In the time since lockdown ended, I have been out playing (also at the Jazz Bar) with the fantastic Sue Mackenzie with Jose Rojas Navea, Esther Swift, Patrick Kenny and Russell Kirk
A bit further back we played the Edinburgh Jazz Festival with Haftor Medbøe in the company of Sue McKenzie, and Signy Jakobsdottir.
Covid Days with Bancroft & Lyne
This graphic was our survival technique during lockdown. As Sophie and I are a couple, we took the opportunity to get into livestreaming and performing our weekly (mostly) 8PM Monday Night Gig. When we started we just stuck a phone on a music stand and played a set. As Covid continues and time went on, we became increasingly sophisticated in our production slowly upgrading the sound, the lighting, and the video presentation.
Eventually, through the marvels of OBS Studio, we even integrated items like pre-recorded interviews with fellow lockdown musicians (recorded through an ope window in our sitting room), and featured short film videos by Sophie and sound design projects from me. We keep having a conversation about getting back to doing some more livestreams but it is like we just don’t have the time anymore. These shows took a lot of preperation and effort.