Originally posted on 25th February here is a Q & A with Jez Brown who is a photographer and was the creator of a former music night in Bedford called The Curfew Club.
Photo from one of the nights- taken by Jez Brown
So what was it that got you involved in the Bedford music scene?
Good question, oddly enough it was through photography initially, I wanted to combine two of my favourite things and the opportunity to photograph local acts was there every weekend. Through doing this I was able to connect with the local scene very quickly and I haven't really looked back, although I don't tend to wheel out the camera so much these days. What was the idea behind creating the curfew club? The Curfew Club is the new face of a previous venture, Bedford Live presents... which was created initially to promote acoustic music in the town, more specifically in the basement of Harpurs, the restaurant on the corner of Tavistock Street and Harpur Street. This was a weekly event held on a Wednesday night with the attention of bringing in new acts from out of town as well as local musicians. The nights were generally a success until changes were made to the basement and we were no longer able to hold shows there. We moved to Esquires on a more irregular basis with some success, but after a few less successful nights I decided I wanted a break. Last year I decided I wanted to start again so here we are with a brand new name and a slightly different way of doing things. What's behind the name curfew Club? The naming process was arduous as we wanted something that people could feel a part of, we came up with the club idea first then as we wanted a speakeasy kinda feel we went into my other world of burlesque and vintage. I'm not sure if it was myself or Steve who came up with curfew but it was instantly perfect, just the right feel for what we're trying to achieve. How long did you have the idea for? As mentioned before, The Curfew Club idea came about late last year along with the idea of 'interesting music in interesting spaces' and this was when we set about looking for Harpurs type spaces around the town with the aim of matching the artists to the spaces available, so far to some success. How did you pick the venues? Some of the venues picked themselves, some were happy accidents and some we approached directly. For example the Cavalier Club Barber Shop came about due to a random conversation we were having where we both had pretty much the same idea at the same time. 44 Harpur Street I had seen used for a different event and just loved the space so I approached them as soon as I knew We were going to go ahead with The Curfew Club. Other potential venues are now coming to us as they have seen what we are about, which is great for us. What advice would you give to someone wanting to create events like these in other towns or places? The only advice i can offer is to look everywhere for potential spaces and don't just limit yourself to known music venues, then try and match the perfect act to the perfect space. It's actually a lot of fun trying to get the matches right. Finally what advice would you give artists when playing these sort of nights? I'm nobody to give advice to any musicians as I can't play or hold a note myself. All I would say is that our hope is that you enjoy the experience and it would be something you would want to do again...
Photos taken by Jez Brown
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