Jazz concert Carla Bley Chalon-sur-Saône

Jazz concerts featuring "big" names are not very common in this area. The amount of musicians we have had her in the last 10 years with an international reputation can be counted on the fingers of one hand: Jazz Et Caetera and Jazz in Trivy have featured René Urtreger (L'Ascenseur sur l'échafaud with Miles Davis), Rodha Scott has played here once and Biréli Lagrène has played here a number of tims, the last concert together with Didier Lockwood.

Espace des Arts - Chalon-sur-Saône

When not long ago the brochures for Chalon (Espace des Arts) and Mâcon (Le Théâtre) landed in our letterbox we were pleasantly surprised to see that the Carla Bley trio with Steve Swallow – bass and Andy Shephard – tenor and soprano were playing in Chalon.
Carla Bley and Steve Swallow I knew by name although I had never heard them play, not even on record. Paul Bley (Carla's ex) however I had seen and heard live, and I was expecting music along those lines. Tickets were ordered quickly, and I was really looking forward to find out what sort of music this group was playing.

Carla Bley - Internet ca. 2015

Carla Bley, clocking up 80, made a very fragile impression (not so strange at her age) and played surprisingly modest. Something I had difficulty coming to grips with was the fact that all musicians were playing from sheet music, something one does not see very often with jazz groups this size. The music was very calm and quiet, almost docile, and while it is with "normal" jazz concerts not unusual that people are tapping their feet to the beat, the public here was as quiet and calm as the music they were listening to. despite this,

Carla Bley Trio - Internet ca. 2015

I still found it an interesting concert, if only to add Carla Bley to my list of "I have heard him/her live" musicians.
And after this concert it was waiting for another one, this time by John Scofield!

Will the real Mr. Brickmaker please stand up?

We have always thought that Noël Marembeaud, no matter how the name is spelled, has been the founder of La Tuilerie de Chazelle. All clues were pointing in that direction: dozens of bricks we found around the house, a number of floor tiles, some roof tiles, all with his name printed on them, the memorial plaque which I have mentioned earlier, with his name, birth year and year of death chiselled in….

The well known stamp

Whenever we found another broken or damaged brick with his name printed within its distinctive cadre, we hardly looked at them, convinced as we were it was another Marembeaud brick.
Until Sue decided to protect the roots of a plant with some old roof tiles and broken bricks she had found somewhere.

La Tuilerie (sketch Michel Bouillot)

Without any apparent reason I picked up one of the bricks and noticed that the name I was expecting was not that of Marembeaud, but a totally unknown name to me of which most likely the first letter was missing.
Without too much fantasy one might draw the following conclusion: the name on the brick was "(B)OURGEON ANTOINE", with under it the text "(A CHA)ZELLE". The letters between brackets are my guess.

The odd one out

Bourgeon is not an uncommon name around here, and based on the length of the cadre around the name it seemed unlikely that there had been more than one letter in front of OURGEON. The question boils down to the following: who was the founder (or the successor) of La Tuilerie de Chazelle? The name Marembeaud occurs most frequently; Bourgeon we have only encountered once. And maybe Bourgeon was someone who ordered a load of bricks and wanted his name engraved in them.

To tell the truth (Saint Nicholas) Dutch version

To paraphrase the old game show "To tell the truth": "Will the real Mr. Brickmaker please stand up?". However, that would be a resurrection from the grave, I am afraid….

Click here for the website of La Tuilerie de Chazelle.