Looser in Noosa: How Ric got his Groovalicious back

More than 10 years have passed since Ric Halstead left his job as musical director at the old Lan Kwai Fong Jazz Club to try his luck in Brisbane, so he may need some introduction. Jazz fans of a certain age will remember the saxophonist and occasional South China Morning Post contributor well. Back in the mid-1980s there was scarcely any modern jazz in Hong Kong that he didn't have something to do with. Halstead led various bands, usually in partnership with Dave Packer, Eugene Pao or both, and made records - later CDs - that have stood the test of time well. These include Sketches, a series of musical portraits of Hong Kong composed by Halstead and Packer; Chance Encounters, an acoustic trio album made by Pao and bassist Eddie Gomez, best known for his 11-year stint with the Bill Evans trio; and El Jammo, an album by the Kindred Spirits collective with another jazz great, Kenny Wheeler, guesting on trumpet and flugelhorn. Halstead was a founder of the Jazz Club, and, along with entrepreneur Hans Lodders, was the driving force behind it. He booked a long list of world-class performers, and held his own playing with many of them. While serving as musical director, he continued to make albums under his own name and to collaborate with other players. Originally something of a jazz purist, while at the club his tastes broadened to include more rock, blues and world music. As well as playing on the Spoon Meets Pao album, featuring blues singer Jimmy Witherspoon, he performed with Nogabe and Soul Commotion, popular local bands of the 1990s. In 1995 Halstead decided it was time to move on, and began what turned out to be a journey into the musical wilderness, from which he now seems to be emerging. His sojourn in Brisbane started with a bang. In 1996 he opened a new live music venue called the Healer - Music for the Soul. The name might not have been helpful. Other circumstances, including the state of the Australian economy at the time certainly weren't, and Halstead left the venture. A more successful gig playing in bands for corporate events wasn't quite enough to keep him in Brisbane, and in 1999 he decided to see what was on offer in his native Britain. Not much, as it turned out. 'I actually gave up playing for nine months, and to make ends meet tried my hand at executive driving,' Halstead says. 'Not really my bag. I did get to drive Dee Dee Bridgewater and Eddie Gomez - which was fun, recalling our Chance Encounters recording.' In 2002, reasoning that things couldn't possibly be any worse in Australia, and at least the sun shone there, he headed to Noosa Heads on the Sunshine Coast, where he found another niche he liked. 'There are some excellent creative musicians here. I spent the first year just sitting in with people, finding out who and what was happening, and from that I've developed several really positive creative music associations.' One of these, a duo with singer-guitarist Barry Charles, has put him back on the touring circuit. Gigs are scheduled for Britain in May, and New Zealand later in the year. Halstead hopes to revisit old haunts in Asia, including Hong Kong, with Charles. They've recorded an album together, and Halstead has also made his first solo CD since his time in Hong Kong. 'I made Groovalicious! in 2004. This was inspired by the Noosa lifestyle and is basically laid-back and kicking grooves - all originals. It was only when I heard the Pleasure Kings playing at a local pub that I realised I had the right musicians to record this album,' he says. Groovalicious!, available via richalstead@hotmail.com, is as good as his best Kindred Spirits-era music, with the leader on various saxes, flutes and bass clarinet, supported by a fine band, commendably unsupported by loops, sequencers or drum machines. He has also made new recordings with Charles and Contimba Latina, a five- piece Latin jazz group led by Venezuelan percussionist Jalberto Maldonado that he says is 'very popular with the Latin dance crowd'. He hasn't given up on straight-ahead jazz. He ran into saxophonist Ian Wallace on the Gold Coast. Wallace played for some years in New York with jazz legends Roy Eldridge, Art Blakey and Cecil Payne. 'Ian and I would get together and practise, and eventually formed the Grey Boys, playing Parker and Monk tunes.' It's good to know Halstead has got back to doing what he loves. Good jazz gets performed in some unlikely places, and after playing Groovalicious! a couple of times the urge began to come over me to visit Noosa.