An Interview with Bill Kyle

​Originally from Dunfermline, Bill Kyle was a highly regarded drummer who used his considerable entrepreneurial skills to found and develop ‘Platform’, a Scottish jazz-promoting organisation which, for many years, was highly successful in creating a circuit of jazz events across Scotland.

These provided not only many events that allowed Scottish jazz followers to hear high-class jazz from elsewhere but also a circuit that enabled Scottish jazz musicians to play with visiting jazz musicians from all over the world and provided playing exposure for Scottish-based jazz musicians and bands. ‘Platform’ also provided valuable experience for Scottish-based jazz administrators, enabling them to become effective and successful promoters of jazz in the future. It also brought jazz into a position from which more general arts funding could be sought and secured. Bill Kyle passed away in October 2016.  

​This interview with Bill Kyle (BK) was recorded by Haftor Medbøe (HM) at the Jazz Bar, Edinburgh in October 2015 to contribute to research on Scottish jazz promoters, an output from which, Promotion Anxieties: jazz promoters on the UK scene later appeared in Jazz Research Journal, Vol 11, No 1 (2017), Equinox. 

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​HM: So I guess the first question, and the million-dollar question, is why do you promote jazz? What got you into it? Why do you still do it? 

​BK: Well, I started because I am a musician, so… I’ve always played and I’ve always wanted to create gigs. I’ve always been an organiser which is unlike a lot of musicians who sort of wait for the phone to ring, I am more proactive so I go out there and get gigs for myself and then thinking, if I can do that, I can get gigs for others and do some things. So, it’s been going on for a long time and I ¹actually formed the first Scottish jazz promotion organisation, Platform, way back in the 70s, which lasted a long time and grew in to a six branch Scottish touring organisation and then morphed in to Assembly Direct and now you’ve got Rogerⁱ and Fiona² [Jazz Scotland] handling that, but that was the first arts-funded organisation, and arts funding is pretty important.  

​HM: And do you still enjoy arts funding in the activities you do here at the Jazz Bar? 

​BK: The Jazz Bar gets no funding from anybody because it’s a commercial business and therefore has to survive on its own…its own behaviour, but I have a separate parallel company called Bridge Music LTD, which I formed about 10 year ago, Bridge Music is a company limited by guarantee which means it’s a non-profit company, it has no employees, no assets, not money and exists purely as a functional vehicle which can then apply for arts funding. 

​HM: I see. 

​BK: That’s why I formed it in that way. 

​HM: And does Bridge Music promote throughout Scotland? 

​BK: Bridge Music, in the past couple years has got funding from Creative Scotland to promote 2 gigs a week, year round in Glasgow and Edinburgh. 

​HM: I see. 

​BK: So Bridge Music promoted Wednesday nights in an Edinburgh venue and Thursday nights in a Glasgow venue of touring international bands, UK based bands and locally based bands doing something original, so it’s a pretty valuable part of Scotland’s jazz scene. 

​HM: Absolutely … and what kind of venues do you use in Edinburgh for Bridge Music stuff? 

​BK: There is a place called the jazz bar that’s quite handy. 

​HM: OK, yes. 

​BK: It’s got everything on stage that you need, grand piano, drums, double bass, amp all that sort of stuff, and it’s got a valuable marketing machine that helps promote the gigs … there is a kind of side effect of that in that the Jazz Bar as a business exists…it’s only income is bar sales, every gig that is put on in the Jazz Bar has a door charge but that money all goes to musicians who are playing on that particular time slot, none of it goes to the venue. So … when there is Bridge Music gig here on a Wednesday night, it’s a higher door charge and a more rarefied audience and it’s a listening gig … the business actually suffers because people aren’t buying anywhere near as many drinks.  

​HM: That’s actually a really interesting observation because that’s one that Roger and Fiona made also at Jazz Scotland, delineating the difference…making that distinction between a listening gig and a social gig if you like … I suppose in that you always have some kind of a door charge here, people, perhaps are more likely to take the music seriously … if you compare it to Whigham’s or something where it is completely free and people are really there for … partly to chat and catch up. 

​BK: Well yeah, that’s right, social.  

​HM: Interesting. 

​BK: Rab Adams ³mentioned last week “take a look at some YouTube clips of Whigham’s gigs, all you hear is [makes impersonation of a group of people chatting] and a band in the distance.  

​HM: Yeah, no that’s absolutely it.  

​BK: [referring to impersonation of a group of people chatting] You can edit that out, sorry. 

​HM: Nah, I won’t, I am just wondering how we are going to spell it. But that’s also got a social function and it is part of the glue that is the jazz scene here. 

​BK: That’s right 

​HM: It would be interesting in a way to do a survey of how much cross-over there is between all these different kinds of audience; the ones that go to the Jazz Festival in the summer, the ones that come here year out and the ones who go to Whigham’s year out and whether they are some of the same people. I have seen Bill Flucker a few times. 

​BK: Yeah, he comes here a lot. Are you aware of an audience survey done by The Audience Business (TAB)? 

​HM: No I’m not. 

​BK: 2011 [2010]. A very detailed survey of jazz audiences. 

​HM: In Scotland? 

​BK: In Scotland. 

​HM: Fantastic. 

​BK: You can get a copy of that. TAB. 

​HM: I’ll dig it out. Would you say? … I mean you’ve just said you have been promoting for a good long time. Have you noticed any sort of changes in the way that you conduct your promoting or have had to adapt your promoting to tie in with changes elsewhere? For example the Internet and YouTube, Facebook … I mean is it a very different activity from what it used to be? 

​BK: It’s a different marketing activity, certainly and a different programming activity, I encourage people looking for a gig and a different programming activity in terms of people looking for a gig. I encourage people who are looking for a gig “do not send me a CD, do not send me a massive attached audio file, just send me a link to something” and that is the most efficient way of doing it.  

​HM: And what informs your programming then? … You know, once you’ve had access to listen to …. 

​BK: Knowledge of the scene, I try and stay as knowledgeable as possible…which is not easy but … Jazzwise Magazine is quite handy, it’s got lots of good information in it all of the time, I try and get to some of the jazz festivals now and again. Concurrently and coincidently the Musicians Union has a jazz section with three and half thousand members and I am on the UK committee so that helps stay informed…and keep alive and… 

​HM: Absolutely, I found that when I used to sit on the Regional Exec and yeah you do … your ear is closer to the ground than it otherwise would be.  

​BK: Definitely, but it’s important to meet people on the scene and invariably names come and it’s like “oh, who’s this, new guy on the scene, I will check him out”. 

​HM: So I guess one of my questions is, are you influenced by your taste in terms of what you put on – in that it’s a private business and you are not beholden by any public funding? 

​BK: The Jazz Bar or Bridge Music? 

​HM: The Jazz Bar, specifically. 

​BK: The Jazz Bar, I program according to what I think is going to go down in this particular environment on certain nights of the week. As I mentioned earlier about one third of the hours per month of music we put on in the Jazz Bar, one third is jazz, one third is kind of roots, blues, acoustic singer/songwriter kind of stuff and the other third is funk/soul electric which is mostly the late night. Each of those one third sectors brings in a different audience and there are crossovers all over the place.  

​HM: Would you say it develops an audience therefore? 

​BK: As long it’s… the common denominator is it’s all good quality music, so if someone comes in for an acoustic gig that finishes at 8:30, there like: “what’s on next? Jazz? I don’t like jazz, oh I’ll stay for another pint…god these guys are good, who’s that trumpet player?”. 

​HM: I talked a lot about that with John Stout⁴ as well that quite often if you present as something else or by accident people go “Oh, I didn’t realise I liked jazz”. 

​BK: Yeah exactly, that’s right, the J word. But yeah, it works here, ehm but in terms of programming, the jazz part of that pie chart, again I try and vary it according with what I think is going to go with audiences in here, and it’s got to work. It’s not a concert in here, it’s a bar, it’s not a noisy bar, people do listen but they also drink and chat in the background, but it’s not a high noise level environment.  

​HM: Or dance on occasion. 

​BK: Absolutely, go on… 

​HM: What kind of relationship do you have with the press? Or do you need to have a relationship with the press? 

​BK: Press relationship is minimal, the most important newspaper in Edinburgh is the Scotsman and they never come here. Occasionally, there’s one guy, Jim Gilchrist, who will do a review at some point, but it’s once every four months or something, and it’s never a preview; it’s a review, so it’s not helped promote the gig. I send the listings out, but I don’t know how many of them they actually get. 

​HM: So you rely on your own database and your Facebook page and Twitter I would imagine.  

​BK: Yeah exactly, the Jazz Bar has an email list now of 2800 people.  

​HM: Wow. 

​BK: And they have all opted in, and I send them a regular broadcast every two weeks. 

​HM: Yeah I know, I get them. 

​BK: You’re on that list, you’re going to get one later today once I get home and finish…But that’s important. Now that goes to all kinds of people who are interested in all kinds of music, it’s not just the jazz thing, but that also include information on the Bridge Music gigs that are happening here, so the jazz people will pick up on that and other people will pick up on…for instance on Friday night we’ve got a Polish group here and the guys is playing an EWI. 

​HM: Oh Yeah, I remember them, Electronic Wind Interface … 

​BK: Electronic wind instrument. “Here’s a clip of Michael Brecker using one, check this out and so on” 

​HM: OK … So would you say in some ways you are informing your audience as you go, or in some ways you are softly educating them? 

​BK: I see that as an important function, definitely yeah, I try and work in some kind of story or angle or snippet or news snippet or YouTube clip or something that kind of interesting that will catch people’s eyes or ears.  

​HM: That’s really interesting as well because that’s something that came up with Assembly [Jazz Scotland], you know, that it’s about putting something in front of an audience that they haven’t seen before and entice them in and I think that sounds like a great way of doing it.  

​BK: Getting back to your question about programming jazz in the Jazz Bar … I guess I am keeping it fairly central in terms of … you won’t find much in the way of free-form or avant garde happening in here, but you would find that on a Bridge Music gig because that needs subsidy. 

​HM: I see…yeah…that was actually going to be one of my questions which you’ve now beautifully answered, but, is there a kind of house aesthetic, or a house style? But you’ve kind of already said it’s a three-way split between genres. 

​BK: We’re doing New Orleans trad jazz stuff right up to very modern stuff. 

​HM: And including big band on the way. 

​BK: Big band every Monday, it’s dead popular [inaudible] This is the guys coming in from the Edinburgh University Jazz Orchestra, from 4 [o’clock] sort of thing.  

​HM: We’ll be two minutes [to a member of Jazz Bar staff]. To what extent … this is a really big question, I suppose in some ways and you don’t have to give me a long answer … to what extent would you say that your activities shape or affect the local scene? What do you think your place is in the local scene? 

​BK: I would like to think it is quite important, especially with the Bridge Music scene, we are bringing in international touring bands, London based bands, European Bands who otherwise would not be here and local musicians are hearing this and being stimulated by it and excited by that and are like “oh … wow”. 

​HM: That’s a really interesting point as well, if I can just pick up on that, because obviously local musicians, when they see international musicians coming in, there is quite often a jealousy “I could do that gig, how come I’m not doing that gig” and there’s a certain cachet and you know, mystery but as you say that feeds the local scene by … 

​BK: It’s an important stimulus … 

​HM: By stimulating it. 

​BK: We had a gig last week, a Bridge Music gig with Julian Arguelles with Kit Downes and James Maddren and … absolutely amazing writing and lots of young guys from the jazz course in Glasgow came to that gig and they were all open mouth “wow” and hopefully they’re going away thinking I want to right like that.  

​HM: Yeah, and they are going to absorb some of what they’ve seen.  

​BK: Also, last year, the Creative Scotland funding that Bridge Music got, had a condition attached, it was that this should be used for some sort of development of musicians. So I used that for purely local bands or occasionally and incoming band from London or the US I would attach a couple lessons for local players on to that, so that they got developed individually. Eh … Alan [inaudible] … I’ll come back to that. 

​HM: Yeah 

​BK: But I also challenged local … I went to Chick Lyle, I went to local guys, Pete Johnstone and said: “Look, you’ve got a gig in three months’ time in Glasgow and Edinburgh, I want a programme of two hours all original music, go!”. “Oh… who can I use?” “You choose.” 

​HM: Yeah … fantastic, yeah that’s a great opportunity.  

​BK: And what that produced was excellent stuff, really good all round stuff. 

​HM: And I suppose in their own way the Edinburgh Jazz Festival also do similar… 

​BK: They’re doing more of it now.  

​HM: They’re doing more of it and I think, without speaking out of turn, I think that maybe they are playing catch up a little bit, and again it has been a stimulus what you do here.  

​BK: Yeah it’s great.  

​HM: Just to close off in a way, what are the biggest obstacles for you in promoting jazz in this city and this climate.  

​BK: In the Jazz Bar? 

​HM: Yeah, specifically the Jazz Bar maybe. 

​BK: I suppose the biggest problem is getting the word out. One thing that constantly disappoints me is the musicians, they don’t come to the gigs, for God’s sake get in there! There is so much good stuff happening, especially on the Bridge Music side of things which is stuff you can’t hear anywhere else, there’s not enough actual musicians coming out, on a Wednesday night, Thursday night I don’t believe they are all working, but there should be a lot more interest in that. Audience development is a constant issue, email, Facebook all that kind of stuff is modern tools that are being used.  

​HM: But it’s easy to get lost in all of that as well. I mean with Facebook, you’re there for two seconds then your off the page, more so with Twitter maybe.  Great … I think that kind of … unless you’ve kind of got anything that you think would be important to add … 

​BK:  Well, for Bridge Music, without the funding it wouldn’t happen. An application went in yesterday to Creative Scotland … the current programme finishes the end of January, an application’s just gone in for the full year from the 1^st of February, so we are in the hands of the gods there. But Creative Scotland have now got their act together in a big way, they are much more positive than they were a couple years ago they didn’t know what was happening, they were in complete disarray, now they are much more consolidated so I am hoping that will produce some more funds to keep it going.  

​HM: So where that side of it relies on public funding…the other one is on a door-charge that goes to the musicians, is there a guarantee with that or is it up for them to bring in … 

​BK: Bridge Music requires funding because it’s expensive bands and we pay them a good rate, we pay them the MU rate, and international bands expected to be covered for hotels and transport and all that …The Jazz Bar gigs, because the venue gets no subsidy and the only sales [inaudible] bar sales, then all we have is door money if you can manage to understand that? On the late night gigs, we will top up the money if it’s absolutely minimal, we will top it up with some bar money, and we do that on most late night gigs, the 12-3 slot 7 nights a week, the bands are getting a bar percentage as well as the door money, which is a reasonable rate for a Sunday night at 2am or a Monday night or Tuesday night at 2am and you’ve got a 7 piece band on stage from 12-3 etc. So these guys are getting…we are contributing a lot of money to the Scottish music economy on both those fronts.  

​HM: I’ll say! And it’s also interesting that you are running things that are so different, in parallel in a way, you know one publicly funded and one privately funded, well not funded but paid for, and that is an interesting model. Great, I think that’s good … if … yeah? We’re done, thank you.​