Formed in Nottingham the Mercia Jazz Band were a New Orleans Style Revivalist, Trad Jazz Band who played regularly in Nottingham and around the country in the 1950’s and 1960’s carrying on in name to the 1990’s.

The Mercia Jazz Band were formed in 1952 and led by clarinet player Frank Goodman. He and fellow Nottinghamonian Eddie Blackwell met and recruited more players to form their band. One more from Nottingham, three from Lincoln and one from Caundon? made them a seven piece. Caundon? maybe it’s Caunton near Newark.

They debuted on January 10th 1953 at the Odeon Theatre stage in Nottingham, a gig promoted by the Nottingham Rhythm Club run by Ken Allsop. The Mercia Jazz Band became the resident band at the Rhythm Club for many years, the Trent Bridge Hotel (Inn) eventually becoming their base.

1st Line up 1953:
Frank Goodman: Clarinet (Nottingham)
Eddie Blackwell: Trumpet (Nottingham)
Tony Attenborough: Trombone (Nottingham)
Bill Bailey: Piano (Lincoln)
Pete Jackson: Drums (Lincoln)
Pete Lobly: Bass (Lincoln)
Richard Spickernel: Guitar (Caundon?)

Initially, they played the Odeon Ballroom where the Rhythm Club held their dances and supported the likes of Humphrey Littleton, Bobby Mickleburgh, the Merseysippi Jazz Band, Charlie Galbraith and his Jazzmen, Mike Collier and his Chicago Rhythm Kings & Beryl Bryden and Jo Lennard.
Tony Attenborough was only a member of the group for a year and would join “Johnny Hobbs Stompers” from Kimberley. There is a story about the career of Tony Attenborough’s wife, Irene, at the very bottom of the page.

By 1954 the line up had changed.

2nd Line up 1954:
Frank Goodman: Clarinet
Trevor Hones: Trumpet
Alan Parkin: Trombone
Bill Bailey: Piano
Mike Magrath: Drums
Maurice Coleman: Guitar

The Nottingham Rhythm Club found a new home at the Plaisance Yacht and Country Club by the River Trent, Wilford Lane side. This is where the Rivermead Flats are nowadays. There was still periodical events at the Odeon Ballroom but they also played the Apex Club in Manchester as their name grew in stature.

In 1955 they played the Queens Hall in Nottingham alongside national names like Chris Barber’s Jazz Band, Ottilie Patterson and Lonnie Donegan’s Skiffle Group. In July of the same year they were taped at a Nottingham Rhythm Club meeting for transmission for British forces overseas. A picture of the band appeared on the front of the Nottingham Guardian and they were the band playing at the “Rag” dance at the Queens Hall when students got out of hand during a mascot ceremony and police had to be called. The scramble ended up on the streets and up towards the Mechanics Cinema. An eighteen year old Susan Chettle was in the thick of it. A lifelong Jazz fan, she told me in conversation in 2020 that, she remembered Big Bill Broonzy visiting her parents house for a meal in 1955. Her father owned the “Chettle Haulage Company” in Nottingham. She later married Don Read who had worked for Johnny Dankworth in a managerial capacity among many others in a long career.

Trevor Jones would go on to form his own “Trevor Jones Jazzmen” in the fifties.

In 1957 their line up consisted of

Frank Goodman: Clarinet
Ray Crane: Trumpet
Alan Parkin: Trombone
Fred Pay: Piano
Claude Whittle: Bass
John Reid: Guitar
Paul Russell: Drums

Fred Pay and Claude Whittle had been playing Jazz since the 1940’s at the beginning of the Jazz revival in Britain.

The band travelled the country far and wide, Humphrey Littleton’s club in London, the West Coast Jazz Club Liverpool and clubs in Bradford and Leicester among any others and there would be many line ups but Frank Goodman remained as the band leader. In November 1957 they were also writing their own tunes and the band made plans to record a a song called “Satellite Rag”, written by Alan Parkin, about Sputnik which had just been launched into space. Another composition by Frank Goodman was written to accompany it.

They were often a headline band, in November 1958, playing to 500 people in the Drill Hall, Grimsby and they also celebrated their 5th anniversary at the Odeon Ballroom with the Mersysippi Band in support.

Mick Hallam had replaced Ray Crane when he went to University in the late fifties and became a mainstay until he emigrated to Australia in 1966. By the sixties Terry Shaw had become the leader of the band and Ralph Laing took over Fred Pay’s position when he went to Germany for three weeks to take a computer course.

In 1967 Ray Crane re-joined the band after many years success with his own band and Bruce Turners Jump Band playing a great solo on “You Can Depend On Me” on his return gig. Banjoist Eric Peat sang a couple of vocals “Dr Jazz” and “Where Should I Go”. The also returned Fred Pay let his mother, Katie, who used the lead a ragtime band in the 1920’s, play the piano.

The band played on, with many personnel changes, through the seventies and into the 1990’s, playing their favourite Revivalist Jazz to new audiences.

NEWSPAPER CUTTINGS

1953

1954

1955

1956

1957

1958

1959

1961

1962

More coming………

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Tony and Irene Attenborough.
In 1967, an article appeared in the Nottingham Evening Post about Irene Attenborough, who was Tony’s wife.

The whole article as it looked below.