News

Its 2010 and I have the great honour of being the featured support artist for the Branford Marsalis Quartet tour of Australia! Budget restrictions mean it will be a trio, the first time I've toured with a trio under my own name. I will be joined in Perth, Brisbane and Sydney by my great colleagues Tom Vincent on Piano and Hugh Harvey on drums. In Melbourne, for the Hamer Hall concert, we will be joined by my longtime favourite collaborator, Eamon McNelis on trumpet.

This tour is in March, and look out for our extra club shows, on Sunday March 14 at the Ellington Jazz Club in Perth, and Saturday the 20th of March at the brand new '505' club in Sydney. You never know, we might even get some very special guests.....

Check out Branford's dates on the web.

March 15th - Perth

March 16th - Melbourne

March 18th - Brisbane

March 19th - Sydney

Old News

In 2009 I decided to focus on our spin off group, 'The Sheiks'. The Sheiks have held the sunday residency in the Federation Square Atrium for the last 3 years. Usually just bass, trumpet and accordion, I would often add drums or another horn, so it was a very blurry line between the Leigh Barker Quintet and the Sheiks! Our pianist Matt Boden has been playing accordion when there is no piano available, and as he lives in Paris now we usually feature Anthony Schulz on accordion.

Therefore this year I booked a few gigs around Melbourne as 'The New Sheiks', and we had three different lineups, including Al McGrath and Phil Collings on drums, Eamon McNelis on trumpet, Julian Banks on saxophone, Don Stewart on trombone and Anthony Schulz on accordion. So we had a great mish-mash of the Leigh Barker Quintet and The Sheiks, and three great swingin nights out.

I'm off to France, Denmark and America this winter so keep a look out for more Sheiks gigs later in the year.