Ghosts Of Soirées Past

The roaring '20s will be recreated for one night only in the splendid heritage ballroom of Malvern Town Hall. The frocks! The style! The music! Even the cars. Champagne, hot jazz, New Orleans brass, Dixieland, swing and big band tunes will be the order of the night. There will be classic cars, market stalls and a vintage photo booth. flappers and fly boys, dames and dapper dans are all welcome. There is no official dress code but if you want to fit in, dress to impress, come swanky and spiffy. Starting your toes tapping will be The Horns Of Leroy brass band, which will welcome you into the soiree with their New Orleans brass band music and modern funk and soul repertoire. Trad jazz and Dixieland sextet Shirazz will continue the entertainment. They say a set from Shirazz is a step back in time to a jumping New Orleans dance hall, where fast, hot tunes complement swing standards and laid-back Louisiana street beats. Shirazz should be enjoyed irresponsibly and in excess.

Hotfooting it late into the night will be Cairo Club Orchestra, a ten-piece vintage dance orchestra who faithfully interpret songs of the 1920s, '30s and '40s. The appeal of this era, says Cairo Club Orchestra band leader Peter Milley, is “lots of things”. He explains, “After World War I there was just this huge, not a renaissance but a huge development, in literature, art, engineering, you name it, there was just this explosion and things advanced very rapidly, especially music. Music in 1920 is very different from popular music in 1930. In ten years, from the '20s, the fashions went from great, big floppy hats to bobbed haircuts and short dresses, then The Depression came along and nipped that all in the bud and America went more conservative in the '30s. But the fashions of course, the clothes, they look good and they're really comfortable to wear. I've got a '30s brand new pinstripe suit; it's very comfortable.”

So there you go – not only will you look awesome, you'll be comfortable. Which is good because you should come prepared to dance. Milley is clearly a sucker for the era, and not just for the fashions. “It's comfortable and it looks good but there's plenty of substance and depth in it all,” he says. “People were proud of what they did once, whether it was music or making cars or all of that, and the customer was always right, there was a different business attitude back then as well. It was a simpler era in some respects.” He has noticed a resurgence in popularity for the fashions and taste of the era in the last few years. “Worldwide, the vintage fashions and the music, there's a lot of young people involved in it,” which is great for his band, who specialise in original arrangements of songs from the era. “My band is what you'd call a dance orchestra really, or a jazz orchestra. It's the standard size, they had them in the swing era and they had them in every country as well. And the music and all the arrangements for the bands to play all the jazz stuff or whatever it was was published everywhere, there's a whole world of it. The best of all that music really stands the test of time. You had to be pretty athletic to play it convincingly. Modern pop music is more lateral. It doesn't jump up and down a lot. '20s tunes are a bit ragtime-based and blues-based, the tunes themselves are actually made of chord intervals. It's challenging to play, it requires a fair bit of dedication to play it convincingly, because it's only convincing when it works.”

What does he think The Gatsby Winter Soirée will be like? “Don't use the word 'vibrant' whatever you do, everyone uses that! I'd say exotic. And there'll be a lot of energy.”

Friday 31 May - Malvern Town Hall, Malvern VIC