TEAM RNS PRESENTS

ARTIST: Jamie Cullum

RIPPER: Team RNS

0hr 56min total- 82.2mb

RELEASE DATE: 2003-10-20
RIP DATE: 2003-10-03

01 What A Difference A Day Made   5:08
02 These Are The Days             3:21
03 Singin' In The Rain            4:07
04 Twentysomething                3:41
05 But For Now                    3:55
06 Old Devil Moon                 4:11
07 I Could Have Danced            3:24
08 Blame It On My Youth           3:10
09 I Get A Kick Out Of You        4:10
10 All At Sea                     4:32
11 Wind Cries Mary                3:37
12 Lover, You Should Have Come    4:49

13 It's About Time                4:06
14 Next Year, Baby                4:48

Long before Robbie was even in Take
That, years before the Pop Idols had
even heard of Cole Porter, Jamie Cullum
was experimenting with not only the
music of his youth (from grunge to
heavy metal) but also the tunes sung
by cool people in suits he found
liberally populating his parents record
collection. Taking the lead from his
older brother Ben an 8 year Jamie took
up guitar, piano and eventually
singing. It wasnt untill deep into his A
Level studies where Jamie seemed to be
moving swiftly towards an academic
career, that he became frustrated with
the inability to concentrate on music.
He decided to take a year off to
continue teaching himself music and
develop his increasing interest in Jazz
Piano which his older brother was
fuelling with an introduction to
records by Oscar Peterson and Dave
Brubeck. A long stint of travelling and an
extended stay in Paris where Jamie not
only saw a massive amount of live music
but also started to play piano in
cafes and bars only strengthened this
desire. Returning to England Jamie
started playing piano in hotels and
weekly at a local Jazz pub whose regular
appearances encouraged him to learn
more tunes. It was only one week when he
ran out of tunes at the local pub that he
decided to sing and play the tune Do You
Know What it Means to miss New Orleans
where he realised that he might have a
professional career. This first
piano/vocals moment lead to countless
meetings with influential local musicians
and Jamie started to appear prolifically
on a growing local Jazz scene learning
his craft with some of the most
experienced musicians in Britain.

Despite these early successes including
many with cutting edge local pop and
hip-hop bands Jamie still decided to go
to University to study, initially
English Lit at Reading. Once again fate
seemed to steer Jamie towards something
more creative as he was offered a place
on the prestigious Film and Drama
course. A crossover seemed inevitable, and
soon Jamie was composing and performing
music for films and plays, also acting
and producing his own short films and
plays. Throughout his degree Jamie
still found time to develop his musical
career which saw moves into the Oxford
jazz scene and the beginnings of
appearances in London.

At only 19 Jamie decided it was time to
produce his own CD never for one minute
considering outside involovement - he
decided to fund and produce it himself
using his current Trio. The resulting
CD "Jamie Cullum Trio - Heard it all
Before" became something of a local
phenomenon and sold over 700 copies just
at Jamies gigs alone. It was normal for
him to regularly sell 50 + at pub
concerts. Jamie also began a relationship
with the Berkshire Youth Jazz Orchestra
now known as The Pendulum Big Band and
appeared with the band at The Brecon
Jazz Festival and at concert halls
throughout England. It was through this
association that Jamie met world class
bass player Geoff Gascoyne. After
hearing him sing, Geoff asked Jamie to
appear on his album Songs of the Summer
with top class British Musicians Ben
Castle, Gareth Williams, Anthony Kerr
and Sebastiaan de Krom.

Jamie Graduated from University in the
summer of 2001 and spent the following
three months travelling and playing in
Europe. Returning to England in
September, he moved into a flat in
London and set up a new trio featuring
Geoff Gascoyne and Sebastiaan de Krom.
Using funds raised from his last CD
Jamie decided to record another album
with his new trio. Encouraged by
Geoff, Jamie started to write horn
arrangements by ear and the album, which
would become Pointless Nostalgic was
expanded with tracks featuring a seven
piece band using the cream of Britains
brass talent. With the album in the bag
by Christmas 2001 Jamie decided to
concentrate on his other musical
projects whilst saving money to afford
to mix and master the album. It was
around this time that Jamie received an
email from Candid artist Clare Teal who
had bought a copy of Jamies first CD and
liking what she heard arranged a meeting
in her home town of Bath. Clare heard
the master takes from the new album and
inspired by what she heard, made it a
personal mission of hers to have Alan
Bates of Candid Records have a serious
listen to what she believed to be a
major undiscovered talent.

Clares persistence soon paid off and
after a few listens to the new record
and a trip to see Jamie at the Salena
Jones Jazz and Music Rooms, legendary
producer Alan Bates deicided to snap him
up within the week. With increased
funding Jamie recorded more material
for the album including the originals
I Want to be a Popstar and Pointless
Nostalgic. Publicity from the Candid
Deal lead to Jamie being invited to
perform at 606 Club, Ronnie Scotts with
Geoff Gascoyne, Pizza Express Jazz Club
and other leading venues. With word out
on such a new, original talent Radio 2 and
BBC London soon got involved regularly
playing tracks from the unreleased
album and featuring interviews based
on their own belief that here was a
star in the making.

Michael Parkinson, hearing Pointless
Nostalgic began to champion Jamie on
his BBC Radio 2 show, regulalrly playing
tracks from the album. Then the big labels
started to take an interest, with both
Universal and Sony in the picture at
one point. Universal won out
eventually, signing Jamie for a record
breaking one million pounds. Not a huge
amount in pop terms, but phenomenal for a
jazz artist. This figure is the amount
of money that Universal will spend
helping Jamie make albums over several
years although if you believed everything
you read at the time then it seemed that
Jamie had suddenly gone overnight from
playing at smokey pubs, weddings and
anywhere else he could to having a
million pounds in the bank!

At the same time as this historic deal
was made Parkinson helped out some
more, inviting Jamie to perform on his
TV chat show. After this was aired Prince
Charles, having seen the show invited
Jamie to play at The Queen's birthday
party at St. James's Palace. Just
picture it. There was Jamie, alongside
such famous company as Ronnie Corbett,
Penelope Keith, Alan Rickman and Maureen
Lipman doing his thing for "Her

Here then, we have an artist, young
perhaps, but already with a wealth of
experience that makes him a talent
worth listening to. A beautiful and
exciting exponent of the standard
repertoire, a growing, catchy and earthy
selection of originals with many more
suprises thrown in. To complete this
already potent cocktail though we have
an unnerving measure of energy which
pours out of every song at his stunning
live concerts and on his albums. An
energy that so intoxicates his
audiences it has lead a huge number of
people to say from critics to audiences
to the BBC JAZZ awards that their tip
for the top in the months and years to
come is undoubtedly Jamie Cullum.

Hi to my sm*it friends..