A delightful lunch date with musician, administrator and all-round good-guy Chris Hodgkins today at the Club for Acts and Actors in Covent Garden. Always a pleasure to exchange news and views with Chris, especially following his organising of the Parliamentary Jazz Awards in October.
Chris was raised in Cardiff, and in 1974 co-founded the Welsh Jazz Festival. He was instrumental, four years later, in establishing the Welsh Jazz Society with David Greensmith. As a jazz trumpeter Chris joined the Icon Jazzmen when he was 18. As a professional trumpeter, Chris toured the UK and Europe with Johnny Bastable’s Chosen Six, Monty Sunshine, Route 66, appeared at the Sacramento Jazz Festival in the States with the Pete Allen Band, and completed tours of Germany with the Chris Haskins Band.
The Chris Hodgkins Band made a name for itself supporting the likes of Buddy Tate, Humphrey Lyttelton, Kathy Stobart, Bud Freeman, Dick Carey, Harry South, Ronnie Ross, Billy Butterfield, Joe Temperley, Howard McGhee, Benny Waters and Wild Bill Davison. The band also made a number of television and radio appearances.
In 1985 he was appointed Director of Jazz Services the national organisation funded by Arts Council England to provide services in information, touring, education, communications and publishing to the UK jazz community. Chris retired from Jazz Services in May 2014. With his days of administration behind him, Chris now takes to the road, the radio and the recording studio to focus on playing the music he loves.
