REMEMBERING NAT GONELLA

Digby Fairweather and special guest Geoff Hiscott remember NAT GONELLA, jazz’s first UK trumpet star with ­unseen movies, records and reminiscences. Digby Fairweather first met Nat Gonella in 1979. “He’d always been a hero of mine” he says “ – but the records were hard to find and the only  way I got familiar with his work was on cassettes of 78s made up for me by an old friend and fan Nobby Brand. The way I finally met my old hero was via a friend Chris Walker (who brings his ‘Salute to Trad’ to The Jazz Centre UK later this year) who told me that Nat turned up to sing with whatever band was visiting a jazz club in Alverstoke nearby to Gosport where he lived. When we met we immediately became close friends and in 1983 I set up a national tour for Jazz Services saluting his music…