Tommy Smith leads jazz orchestra in Lanark

WHEN Scottish National Jazz Orchestra leader Tommy Smith says he's avidly looking forward to their gig at Lanark's Greyfriars Church next week, he isn't buttering up the local audience. He really means it.

For the Saturday, January 30, concert is going to be a rare and even treasured experience for him.

"I'll actually be able to get there and get home that night and not spend the usual three days, jumping from one aeroplane to another!"

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Just a glance at his travelling itinerary for the past year alone tells you instantly that this man is speaking from the heart.

He spends much of his year far, far away from his home of the past ten years in the countryside outside Lanark.

Mind you, Tommy should be used to travelling far and wide by now; after all, at the age of just 42, he's been an globetrotting, professional musician for coming on 30 years.

His position today as an internationally respected figure in the jazz world isn't one you'd have predicted for him, being born in one of Edinburgh's less desirable suburbs.

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"Don't let this accent fool you," he says with his faint American twang, "I can still sound as if I'm straight out of the scheme if I want to."

The Greyfriars concert will see the SNJO re-create its triumph of last summer with a programme of music by the lengendary rock band Steely Dan, the vital guitar parts being taken by another Lanark resident Graeme Scott.

The concert starts at 7.30pm. Tickets, priced 14 (10 OAPs, 7 students, under 4s free), are available at the door.

For more on this in-depth interview with Tommy, pick up a copy of the Carluke and Lanark Gazette which is in the shops now.

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