We found some jazz!

Yay :)

Someone S met on one of his walks told him one of the beach bars in Almuñecar has jazz sessions on Sunday evenings. And separately, when I had my hair cut yesterday (long overdue) the hairdresser told me she liked going down to the sandy part of the beach on a Sunday afternoon to listen to flamenco in one of the bars.

As it happens, we've avoided this part of the beach like the plague. We happened to walk along it on New Year's Eve, and it was hellish: a row of bars each belting out different loud rock music, and hordes of twenty-somethings knocking back cocktails or beer straight from the bottle. 

But it's a quite different affair on Sunday: a laid-back after lunch vibe. The jazz bar turns out to do jam sessions, with what appears to be a resident band. This gravel-voiced blues singer was a total star, and it was also a pleasure to see a female jazz musician playing an instrument (sax and flute) rather than just singing (see extra). The musicians were clearly enjoying themselves and their pleasure was infectious.

From there we stepped along to the hairdresser-recommended bar, which was somewhat more restrained. Two guitarists and a saxophonist playing to four customers ... they looked relieved when we arrived. The other bar had been heaving. They weren't bad, but they were using a pre-recorded backing track for the clapping :(

After our drink there, we reduced the audience figures by some significant percentage and headed off to our ultimate evening destination -- I'd seen a poster for a concert in the church by two Russian singers, and, well, who doesn't want to hear Russian singers? Unfortunately one of them was an excessively warbly mezzo soprano and their programme was of all the most well-known operatic arias you can think of. The only piece I really liked was a traditional Russian song sung a capella by the tenor. I had been hoping for more of that kind of thing.

But anyway, we have found the perfect Sunday afternoon activity;  I'm only surprised that after the many weeks we've spent in Almuñecar we've only just discovered it.